Paul Articulates – Catching up?

The New York Mets have had some difficult years behind the plate in recent seasons, with multiple players logging time there without a record of offensive success.  There have been some fairly good defensive catchers, but not many that worried anyone with a stick in their hands.

The history goes back quite a long way.  In fact, there have only been three Mets catchers since 2010 that have played in at least 75 games and hit .250 or better.  That “elite fraternity” includes Josh Thole and Ronny Paulino who each hit .268 back in 2011 and the Buffalo Wilson Ramos who hit .288 in 2019 after the Mets acquired him from the Nationals.

Let’s take a quick look back through this history of futility to establish the need.

2010 was a “catcher by committee” year, as no single catcher logged even a half season worth of games.  Thole was new to the team, having been called up briefly at the end of the 2009 season.  In the 2010 season Thole and Rod Barajas shared most of the duty.  Thole then held down the starting job throughout 2011 and 2012 without setting the world on fire, so the Mets traded RA Dickey to Toronto for a few guys worthy of note: John Buck took on the 2013 catching duties, mentoring a young Travis d’Arnaud.  Noah Syndergaard was part of that trade as well.

The d’Arnaud years began in earnest the following year (2014) when Travis caught 108 games.  He was a talented player with a good bat, fair defensive skills, and a real knack for managing a pitching staff.  He hit .242 that year, then improved to .268 in 2015, helping that famous Mets club advance to the World Series against Kansas City.  Unfortunately, that was as good as it got.  

D’Arnaud was hurt often, began to struggle defensively, and never put up the kind of offensive numbers that the Mets and their fan base expected.  So in 2019 with an .087 batting average, he got his walking papers and the Mets bought the Buffalo.

As mentioned earlier, Wilson Ramos was a strong offensive catcher who was expected to hit and hit for power.  He delivered as expected in the 2019 season with a .288 average and a .787 OPS.  The problem was that he turned 32 that year, and the wear and tear of catching for so many years began to catch up with him.  The following season he dropped to a .239 batting average and was not renewed for 2021.

In 2021 the Mets had new hope, acquiring the second best free agent catcher in the market in James McCann.  McCann was a promising young catcher who had hit .289 for the Chicago White Sox in the previous season.  He had a cannon for an arm (McCannon) so the hope was that he would be the first complete catcher in many years.  

Unfortunately New York and McCann never got along – he struggled offensively right out of the chute and eventually the fan base turned on him and he was traded to the Orioles in December of 2021.

I hope that you were not too depressed by reading back through that history of the last dozen or so years of Mets catching history.  The reason I laid out that background was to set the stage for the entrance of Francisco Alvarez.  Alvarez was a very highly touted prospect who was signed out of Venezuela in 2018.  He rose through the ranks to become MLB’s top prospect during the 2022 season.  

Alvarez has moved up through the minor league ranks, learning each level of the game quickly and moving to the next level.  He was called up to the MLB club at the end of the 2022 season, seeing a few playoff at-bats in the San Diego series.  In 2023, he played well during spring training but was put on the AAA Syracuse roster to start the season for more development.  

This changed early in April when the Mets’ latest free agent catcher Omar Narvaez went down with an injury.  Alvarez was called up on April 7th and got his first start on April 9th.  Mets fans were very anxious to see him perform and had very high expectations – so high that they were already grumbling when he didn’t start every game.  Alvarez has struggled at first, but this has been the story at every level – he takes a little while to get familiar with the next level of pitching and then he takes off.

Right now I am seeing signs that he is getting more comfortable with MLB pitching.  His contact is getting more solid and his chase rate is going down.  This is a guy with a very powerful short stroke swing that will do some serious damage once he gets comfortable at the plate.  My prediction is that we will see him begin to flourish in the month of May.  Keep an eye on this one – he will be something to watch.