Tom Brennan - Some More Citifield (Non) Hitting Results Insights

    

Let’s not bear around the bush. Pete Alonso hits much better on the road.

Bill Metsiac, one of our astute readers and commenters, asked about the effect of seasonality in baseball, and more specifically, in Citifield.

(Metsiac is his real last name…he did change his real first name from Mets to Bill, just to be clear and transparent, to add some name variety. He does, of course, self-identify as a Mets fan).

So, I looked - I like to see what data tells me.

1) Yes, Citifield is rough on hitters. (But we knew that).

Now, the Mets had really good hitting last season.  You win 101 games, that is most likely a given. 

As a comparative benchmark vs. other teams, I like to see how they did on the road, since it shows the how the hitters hit, free from whether their park is a hitters' paradise, or nightmare.

The Mets in 2022 on the road had the 3rd best OPS (.758), just .004 behind the leading Dodgers (.762).

So...the Mets of 2022 could REALLY rake. 

Their road hitting showed that in spades.

Despite that strong Mets hitting ability, Citifield output (Mets and opponents combined) was just .679 in OPS (24th among 30 parks).

Just 25th in total HRs, too, in the Park That Ruth Didn’t Build (149).  

Now, part of the reason for the lower OPS and HRs by all comers in Citifield in 2022 was strong Mets pitching. But the thunderous Mets had half the Citifield ABs, and the park still comes in as low as 24th-25th in offense?

But, of course, Citifield hurts hitters, but does it help Met pitchers? Heck yeah! How much?  Well, in 2022, Mets hurlers had a 3.06 ERA at Citifield, but a 35% higher 4.10 ERA on the road.

So, in general, hitters get screwed there, and pitchers thrive.

How much of that offensive shortfall is also seasonal?  As in…Ball not carrying out in Citifield? 

Statistically, I could not find such Mets-only home numbers by month, although with more time, I could have created my own stats.

However, all other things being equal, lower averages and slug % reflect less ball carry, at least to some degree.

In 2022, the Mets averaged 4.1 runs per game at home in April, but 4.7 per game on the road - an indicator  (even if short on games played (22) data) that ball carry is worse in Citi in April than elsewhere.

In the 5 full seasons from 2017-22, seasonality was evident. In all games, home and away, in those years in April, the Mets hit .238 with a .387 slug. (Again, I lacked just the home data, and passed on the time needed to calculate it for just home results).

In July, when the ball carries better, those comparable Mets numbers were .243 and .414, a fairly significant higher difference.

So…clearly, Citifield hurts hitters in general…and hurts them even more in April vs. hotter months.

What does all that mean?

If I was Pete Alonso, and the Mets try to low-ball his $$$ extension, in part due to his suppressed Citifield offensive output (the park not being a controllable variable for him), I would head down the Turnpike and sign as a free agent with Philly in 2025.  Or in Colorado. In both parks, he is more likely to hit 500+ career HRs and thus more likely to head to Cooperstown as an inductee some day. 

Paid more AND Hall of Fame? Pretty enticing if you ask me.

Thus ends another deep Mets conversation.

EXCEPT…

You’re the Mets GM, and you currently face severe salary cap issues. Do you extend Pete Alonso anyway? What (if so) would the deal look like, that both the team and the player would be happy with?