Alex Rubinson - Why Soto's Move to Left Field has been Long Overdue

Baseball is in full swing. Spring Training is over a week old, and the World Baseball Classic kicked off last night. The regular season is right around the corner. As March 26th continues to creep closer, top prospect Carson Benge has been turning heads since the team headed to Port St. Lucie. 

The young outfielder has started the preseason 4/13 with a stolen base and a couple of runs scored. Since MLB implemented a new rule where teams can be awarded a compensatory pick if a rookie starts the season with the big league club and finishes at or near the top in rookie of the year voting, more teams have chosen to let their promising phenoms head north with the big league club. Benge could be the next name that follows suit, which means a change for superstar outfielder Juan Soto.

Soto started his big league career with the Washington Nationals as the everyday left fielder but moved to right field permanently only a few short years into his career. The Mets paid Soto $765 million for his bat and not his glove, but at just 27 years old, the team is hoping it can squeeze at least a little value out of the corner outfielder or at the very least ensure he won’t be a liability in left field. 

In 2019, when Soto won the World Series with the Nationals, he was named a gold glove finalist in left field. It’s fair to say we have better defensive measurements than the award, but the nomination shouldn’t be thrown away entirely. When Soto was a rookie in 2018, his defensive value according to Baseball Savant was a poor negative-five and just in the 20th percentile. 

Fast forward a year later, and Soto became league average with a zero defensive value. Although it still ranked below the 50th percentile (47th percentile to be exact), it showed Soto had taken monumental steps in improving his outfield defense. Last season, when Soto was in right, he was in the first percentile with a -13 defensive run value in first season in Queens.  

Over the years, Soto has actually shown he can be an asset when it comes to his arm. It might not be the most consistent, which is why his arm value numbers will fluctuate, but the strength is there. Where Soto has always been plagued is his range. Not even the biggest Soto homer would disagree that his range has been a weak point of his game. In 2019, when Soto was patrolling left field, he actually posted a plus-five Outs Above Average (OAA), which ranked in the 88th percentile. OAA is a metric used to measure a fielder’s range. For context, Jackie Bradley Jr. recorded an OAA of six during the same season. 

One aspect of Soto’s game that has left a lot to be desired is his jumps. Last year, Soto tied for just inside the top 80 with over a -1.5 foot versus the average jump. One foot is a significant difference, which shows how far away he was from just being average. It helps explain why his range has been poor over the years as well. What was his foot versus average jump in 2019 you ask? 

In left field, Soto just missed the top 15 with a positive 1.5 foot jump compared to the average. This was better than many notable defensive outfielders such as Lorenzo Cain, Jarrod Dyson, Jason Heyward and even his own teammate at the time, Victor Robles, among many other well-known defensive stalwarts. That is a three whole foot difference between his jump in right field compared to his jump in left. This more than answers the question as to why his OAA was so much better as a left fielder. It also calls into question why the Nationals ever moved Soto to right field to begin with. 

Now let’s turn our attention to Soto’s aforementioned arm strength. In 2025, Soto barely ranked in the top 60 in right fielders with an average velocity of 86.6 MPH, which was in the bottom quarter of MLB. If we were to use those same metrics and shift everything over to the other corner outfield spot, those numbers look a lot better. 

Soto’s arm strength would be in the top 40 in the league. This still isn’t anything to go home bragging about, but it does represent an improvement. He actually would be ahead of the outfielder he was traded for in James Wood with the Nationals. Wood still might have a higher ceiling as an outfielder with more potential in his arm, but that wasn't the case based on last season’s data. 

Juan Soto will almost certainly never become a gold glove caliber of player in any defensive spot. The Mets will probably shade Luis Robert Jr. over to Soto’s side to help ensure he won’t need to cover nearly as much ground as normally a corner outfielder would be forced to. In all likelihood, Soto is still destined to become a full time designated hitter down the line. 

What this does show is that the rise of Carson Benge might cause positive ripple effects across the entire roster, even to the most expensive baseball player to walk on the face of the earth. If Soto does revert back to his 2019 metrics, the only question to Mets fans and across the majors at large will be why was Soto ever moved from his primary home and why wasn’t he moved back sooner.