Reese Kaplan --Brodie, Please Fix the Outfield!

In November of 2012 at the GM meetings when asked about how he planned to address the shortcomings in the green grass past the infield, Sandy Alderson famously joked, “What outfield?”  At the time, considering he was sporting the likes of guys like Andrew Brown and Collin Cowgill as part of his starting lineup, that quip, like most humor, had an element of truth to it.

After Brodie Van Wagenen addressed some of the Mets’ glaring weaknesses since taking over, including Edwin Diaz and Jeurys Familia in the pen, Robinson Cano and Jed Lowrie on the infield and Wilson Ramos behind the plate, I can’t help but echo Alderson’s 7 year old question. 

Now, to be fair, unlike previous years you do have two solid candidates for the outfield in Michael Conforto and Brandon Nimmo, both of whom could be in the discussion for All-Star berths later in the year.  It’s that third slot that’s bedeviling the ballclub.  The current strategy is hope and wait for the addition of Yoenis Cespedes, but as we’ve seen for the last 7 years, hoping and waiting is not an effective means of transitioning a club into contention. 

In addition to these solid starters you have two suspect players penciled in for some kind of role on the club in 2019.  First there’s the case of Juan Lagares.  His career batting average of .260 is not bad – about league average – but he’s pretty much a one-trick-pony.  (For reference Nimmo is .264 and Conforto is but .251).  

Unlike the other two, however, he’s shown little in the way of power, only minor flashes of speed, little on-base ability and a lot of strikeouts for a guy who doesn’t produce runs.  His calling card has been and apparently always will be his defense which, save for his arm woes post Gold Glove season, is among the best in the game. 

Of course, no discussion of Juan Lagares is complete without the frequent trips to the DL being a part of the narrative.  His high water mark of ABs was 441 in 2015, but it’s been downhill from there with the next three seasons of 142, 252 and 59.  That’s 453 ABs over the course of THREE SEASONS.  Now many would say it’s unfair to get upset with a player for injuries.  I agree.  There have been a great many far superior ballplayers like Moises Alou, Cliff Floyd, AJ Pollock, Grady Sizemore and David Wright whose health betrayed their ability to produce on the field.  

Counting on Juan Lagares to be healthy is foolhardy given the track record and his reckless abandon approach to playing his CF position.  However, even if by some miracle he did stay healthy all year, let’s use his 2014 season as a yardstick since that’s the one that cemented his now extremely overpriced contract.  That year he hit .281/4/47 with 13 SBs.  That’s nice, for sure, but is this lineup strong enough to absorb that kind of modest production?

BVW acquired Keon Broxton from the Brewers in a deal that had many scratching their heads.  There’s no question he has more power and more speed than does Lagares.  He has not had the injury bug bite him, so that’s another check in the plus column.  However, his career batting average over parts of four seasons is just .221.  However, baseballreference.com projects him to replicate that average but with 19 HRs, 46 RBIs and 29 SBs.  Given that his defensive skills are about a match for what Lagares offers, the minimum wage Broxton might be the better bet of these two IF you are willing to accept a guy projected to strike out over 170 times in the lineup every day. 

You have a trio of converted infielders you could try out there -- Jeff McNeil, J.D. Davis and Dominic Smith.  Learning to play at a Major League level is usually not the stuff of on-the-job training.  Yet from what we read that's the plan.

It would seem to me that both Lagares and Broxton are better served as 4^th and 5^th outfielders with stellar defensive skills to complement whomever the starting three will be. However, I think the better approach would be to lock up another outfielder on a one-year deal or expiring contract prior to free agency.  That way you have hedged your bets against a Cespedes-less 2019 and not put league average hitters or worse in your lineup 162 games per year or fielders who do their best Todd Hundley/Lucas Duda impressions.