Reese Kaplan -- Historic Rookie Season by Alonso

Doc Gooden (or Dwight as he was known during his rookie campaign) was likely the Mets’ poster child for an exciting rookie campaign.  To refresh your memory, during his inaugural season of 1984 he went 17-9 with a 2.60 ERA while striking out 276 in just 218 IP.  He was a shoo-in for Rookie-of-the-Year and actually finished second in Cy Young Award voting to Rick Sutcliffe of the Cubs who went an amazing 16-1 across just 20 starts.  You could make a case that he was robbed given his greater win, strikeout and ERA numbers, but then he followed it up with a no-brainer of a season in 2015 when he was 20 games over .500, going 24-4, a 1.53 ERA and 16 CGs.

This year Pete Alonso has a chance to blow Gooden’s spectacular start out of the water.  If you look at the baseball history books, only 27 players have ever reached the lofty 50 home run plateau (having accomplished it 43 times).  Pete Alonso currently sits at 21 HRs through game 65.  With 97 to play if you extrapolate the rate at which he hits home runs he’s on pace for 52.  That puts him in the same group that features Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Roger Maris, Mark McGwire, Sammy Sosa, Barry Bonds, Hank Greenberg, Jimmie Foxx, Alex Rodriguez, Ralph Kiner, Willie Mays and Ken Griffey, Jr. (among others).  That’s heady company indeed.

If you compare rookie seasons, Gooden was worth 5.5 WAR and Alonso is right on his heels at 2.3 WAR through less than half a season.  While no one is belittling in any way what Gooden accomplished that season, Pete has the chance to be the best rookie season in the history of the ballclub. 

Now the Mets have had some stellar rookies in their long history.  Starting with Tom Seaver, then Jon Matlack, Darryl Strawberry, Dwight Gooden and Jacob deGrom, five Mets have that trophy on their shelves.  For a club renowned much more for pitching than hitting, it’s not surprising to see just one hitter here.

Darryl Strawberry’s rookie season was impressive -- .257, 26 HRs and 74 RBIs to go along with 19 SBs and 8 Assists.  He did that over a span of 122 games and 473 ABs.  By comparison, though, Pete Alonso is well ahead of that pace with a .258 AVG to go along with 21 HRs and 46 RBIs across just 64 games and 233 ABs.  If you doubled his stats to more-or-less equal the opportunities Alonso would get vs. Strawberry, that’s 42 HRs and 96 RBIs over just about the same number of ABs.  Not even close.

Well, what about David Wright?  Surely he was a sensational Mets player who came up with a bang.  In his rookie season in 2004 Aat age 21 he came up midway through the year and delivered a .293 AVG with 14 HRs and 40 RBIs through 263 ABs.  The batting average is better, of course, but the run production is not as impressive. 

How about Jose Reyes?  He was not a power hitter, of course, but what did he accomplish during his rookie season in 2003 at age 20?  He hit .307 with 5 HRs, 32 RBIs and stole 13 bases across 274 ABs.  Again, it was a truly nice rookie season but good enough for only 8^th in the voting that year and not nearly at Pete’s historic level.

Of course, now that I’ve chronicled the rare company in which Pete finds himself, I fully expect him to do his own equivalent of falling into a hole and thus interrupt what could have been a record setting rookie season.  These are the Mets, of course, and Injuries ‘R Us.  Still, it’s been great fun watching thus far and in a season threatening to crater he’s become must-watch TV, stopping whatever you’re doing for his AB the way you once did for Darryl Strawberry and perhaps for Yoenis Cespedes back when he was atop horses and his game, and not just the IL.