PC - Herm Card - Ronny Mauricio
Great win last night, 5-0, with 7 shutout innings from 3 old pitchers, Max Scherzer, Adam Ottavino, and David Robertson. But...
When for hitters is young "too young", and when is old "too old"?
Decisions that challenge each and every MLB General Manager.
In other words, if you call up a 20-23 year old, like an Alvarez, Baty, Mauricio, and Vientos, how will they do?
- His peers' performance may give some indication.
Likewise with the 34 and older folks, which include the Mets' Mark Canha, Eduardo Escobar, and Tommy Pham.
- How is the rocking chair crowd doing?
It is quite early in the season, but after Friday's action, and given the fact that Mets' fans are in many cases clamoring for not just Alvarez to be called up, but the other 3 as well, I took a quick sort on guys 23 and under in Baseball Reference's stats and noted the following:
23 AND UNDER:
I looked at 23 and under qualifying players thru yesterday. I removed generational stars Wander a Franco and Julio Rodriguez from the list, and there were 23 hitters left who were 23 or less.
Of those, 12 were hitting .200 or less so far, which tends to support the "wait a while" philosophy.
Of course, occasionally, a guy has a blazing start. Geraldo Perdomo has been on base 8 of 12 times, a small but excellent sample, and LAD’s freaky Miguel Vargas has walked a stunning 11 times in 6 games and has a Bonds-like .682 OBP.
But some struggle.
Jarred Kelenic and Michael Harris are a combined 9 for 43 with 1 RBI.
Pinstripes’ Anthony Volpe is 3 for 21 with 9 Ks.
Lastly, true studs rise…highly regarded Nolan Gorman and Jordan Walker of St Louis are a combined 16 for 48 with 3 doubles, 3 HRs, 11 RBIs. They are just SMART in St Louis, you ever notice that?
34 AND OVER:
At the other end of the age spectrum, and I know it is early, but 19 of 38 MLB hitters 34 and older are hitting under .200.
Included therein are 34 year old Canha (4 for 27, but otherwise very creative at getting on base).
35 yr old Tommy Pham is one of the ones above .200, at 4-13, based largely on his 3 for 4 breakout day, so we will see how he holds up. (His next outing on Saturday was 0 for 4, causing his average to drop 73 points in one game, which shows how very early stats can not provide a meaningful picture).
In any event, 23 and unders, and 34 and olders, are relatively rare species in the major leagues, when it comes to significant playing time.
Only 13 listed hitters above age 35 were found in that stats list, including guys like Miguel Cabrera, Whoa Nellie Cruz, and Justin "the Red" Turner.
So, Pham is in a very rarified group, many of whom are sputtering.
And Lindor? Eons ahead are his last 3 contract years, but those years, totaling a shade under $100 million, will be at the advanced ages 35, 36, and 37.
Escobar? Through Monday, truly consistent....4 for 34 in spring training... and 4 for 34 during the regular season. To get to .250 over those 68 at bats, he would have needed 9 more hits to add to the 8 he's produced. Too old?
Maybe I will do another update on this age-related picture later in April, when more indicative stats have been compiled by the players.
If I'm not too old to do it.
Mark Vientos (above)? Young & ready.
Baty (above)? Ditto.
Photo courtesy of Richard Nelson
Photo courtesy of Richard Nelson
Mauricio (above)? Ditto.
CLOVERS ARE BACK...
It was fairly recently reported that former Met (and Met torturer while with the Nationals) Daniel Murphy will be playing for the Long Island Ducks. Just to scratch an itch, or with thoughts of re-emerging in MLB?
I guess we will find out.
I saw this interesting tidbit on the Ducks' website, showing guys who were Ducks either make it to the majors or make it BACK to the majors - 27 Ducks have done so over the course of time.
“O Danny Boy” Murph just turned 38, and while that is MLB-old, he was a pure hitter in his time, and maybe he can pull off a big league return:
Former Long Island Ducks relief pitcher Michael Tonkin made his first appearance back in the Major Leagues with the Atlanta Braves on Sunday, April 2. He becomes the 27th player in Ducks history to reach the Major League level after playing with Long Island.
KEVIN PARADA AND STOLEN BASES:
The players in high A ball may not be anywhere near major league in caliber, but they are young, and young means “speedy.”
In his first 2 games behind the dish in 2023, Parada is yet to gun down a base stealer. But TWELVE have been successful. Some work to do there.
WHO'S # 1?
So, which Met has the highest OBP while a Met? The great Brandon Nimmo, Jeff McNeil, Francisco Lindor, Pete Alonso?
Nope. Daniel Vogelbach has a Mets career .400 OBP #1...which is interesting, as 40% of Mets Facebook fans seem to despise the guy and can't wait to release him. Their noggins are only operating at 40%.
12 comments:
How bad is Escobar's 8 for 68? The despised Darin Ruf as a Met was 10 for 66.
Interesting stats and analysis, Tom. You are a master at combing through the numbers.
The problem with today’s numbers, though, is that they fall into the "small sample" category. Among players of any age, there are slow starters and guys who do well early but fade when the opponents learn their weaknesses.
If Baseball Reference or another site groups players by age, a look at 2022 stats for the sub-23 and 34+ guys would be more relevant.
Thanks for crunching the current stats, though. Very interesting concept and creative as usual.
Bill, thanks, and that is a good point.
I do not know a good source, Bill, for that breakdown. Baseball Ref does splits, but it is for 25 and under and 36 and over. In 2019, the Mets did well, as they had pounding Pete and Cano.
In 2021 and 2022, awful. Our 25 and unders over those 2 seasons had 209 official ABs and hit .160, and our 36+ were up 61 times, and also hit .160.
The 36 and over slash totals in all of baseball in 2022 were lower than the 31-35 category, but the ABs in 36+ were drastically lower. Meaning the non-performers became ex-performers.
25 and under brings in the likes of Bichette and Guerrero, but my guess is most 23 and unders did not hit well.
I did a quick Excel analysis for the young guys, 23 and under. The youngest of them all last year? Francisco.
32 hit under .200, 35 in the .200 to .250 range, and a little fewer than 30 hit over .250.
One guy I'd bever heard of, Livan Soto of LAA, hit .400 (22 for 55) in 2022, but as best I can tell, is back in the minors for LAA in 2023.
Morning Tom
Is Max back? Gonna talk about this on Friday.
The lack of defensive expertise by both Parada and Alvarez fully exposes how hard it is to find amulti-dimensional player for behind the plate.
I take the term "farm system" more literally than most fans or even media and execs.
On a farm that produces food, that food is consumed by the family that grows it, with the excess taken to markets or sold directly to consumers.
But the general that applies is not eating/selling too soon or too late. And that applies to the customer as well. If we buy something to eat tonight, we don't buy green bananas or rock-hard melons. But we don't want mushy tomatoes, either.
The Gallo Brothers' slogan, "we will sell no wine before its time", applies to baseball as well, except I'd change "sell" to "promote". And the same concept applies to trades. Branch Rickey was quoted as saying "better to trade a year too soon than a year too late".
Just because some players are "ripe" when they're 21, or still "edible" at 36, it's still a question of enough maturity vs too much, and when I see cries to promote kids like Alvarez, Mauricio and Vientos, I see less risk and better quality in an extra year in AAA than in rushing them too soon.
Your article covered under-23s, which is why I picked that #.
I think some fans are down on Vogelbach because the DH is historically a power position, and while Vogey has shown some power, he seems to let hittable pitches go by and is looking to walk, which is not ideally what you want from your DH. Plus he is slow and when he does walk he tends to clog the bases a bit. I like him, but I do think he should be more aggressive at the plate. The Mets need more power.
Jon G, Vogie has power, he needs to not be shy to use it. Mack had a post in 2010 where he was in a HS HR derby and cranked one 510 feet. But he has only been up 21 times, let’s see if it is still a problem at 50 times up. Maybe he feels his stroke is a little off and will resolve it soon.
On the age of players.
I grade players not by age, but instead by what I see with in their playing ability. Each player being totally different, and there being no mold I look for, it's an obvious thing from watching baseball for so long. It's right there (BOOM!) in your face.
With each of the kid players (Brett Baty, Mark Vientos, and Ronnie Mauricio who is playing shortstop at Syracuse and had a big game recently) I immediately saw developed professionalism, smoothness, and a capability way beyond each of their young ages. They had in other words, a more game experienced smoothness and mechanics than just what their respective birth certificates would vouch for. It was as obvious, as obvious could be.
I noticed each of these players MiLB stats while surveying for new talent down in MiLB MetLand, and then watched closely their videos on youtube. It was so obvious that each one had greater talent capability than what is currently on the NY Mets roster.
Now on age.
The Mets to me, do not have a single player on its well constructed team that is on what anyone could call "the age/talent downslide." It isn't the aging downslide point here. It's actually players here entering their mid-thirties with just okay batting averages and very predictable year end statistics. We have a few of these at current. I call some the ".250 BA Guys" because that is their veteran stat sheet talking. Don't get me wrong, a .250 career BA is not bad at all, but to me it is still somewhat average.
The true problem here with this is that often they block the "callup entry point" for the young players like the three mentioned above. By doing so, the younger and deserving players do not make the roster breaking camp and have nowhere else to go but to AAA Syracuse, where they do really well as one would guess they probably would.
I understand NY baseball though. I understand management preferring veteran players with track record of MLB experience. But one thing here with that. Did that work here ever before? A: Yes. One time it actually did. 1986. And that was it.
Sometimes a baseball team's management has to go with "their eyes" and not only predictable okay stat sheets over a career. Call it tener agallas.
It's weird, but I do not include catcher Francisco Alvarez in with the other three younger Syracuse players quite yet anyway, because his hitting sample size at both AAA Syracuse and here with these MLB NY Mets is still somewhat limited.
This is not to say that he won't be terrific here for these Mets. But my being able to forecast him out for here, just is not possible for me on his current stats already logged.
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