Reese Kaplan -- Spring Training is Both Good and Bad Thus Far

Spring Training is all about warming up for the regular season, getting a look at how players you know appear to be preparing for the 6 months of upcoming baseball and evaluating the ones you don’t know in terms of whether they would be better or worse than the alternatives.  It is natural in the early part of the preseason for the pitchers to be ahead of the hitters and looking at numbers for the Mets they appear to be reflecting these metrics.

Looking a bit more closely at pitching you will find that the entire staff is throwing to a pretty impressive 3.22 ERA with just a few clunkers here and there in limited action.  The starters are looking solid as are most of the relievers.  Again, take it with a grain of salt as the games only began a few weeks ago and things could balance out the other way as time goes by.

On the hitting side things are not exactly what you’d hope to see.  The Mets overall are hitting to a less than robust .229 batting average as of midweek numbers.  The highlight thus far are the 14 HRs hit by current and would-be Mets sluggers.  Averaging well over 1 HR per 9 IP is a good thing indeed.  The strikeout numbers are not terrible having occurred in fewer than 24% of the ABs.  That’s a good number given the high number of dingers.

Dig a little deeper and you see some things that shouldn’t concern you and others conversely that shouldn’t necessarily impress you either.  Take Juan Soto, for example.  Before departing for this WBC appearance he was hitting a mere .167.  At his age and his stellar track record you know that he is not that type of hitter and you just write it off to a small sample size and preparatory work.

On the flashing bright lights side, you have the unexpected performances like the .727 batting average earned by outfielder Cristian Pache or the stunning .333 provided by infielder Vidal Brujan.  No one expects either of them to perform at that level over a longer period of time (nor even to make the major league roster unless Brujan is a Francisco Lindor substitute for a few weeks).

Where it gets far more difficult to evaluate are the metrics of the players who are either at best a 4th outfielder or on the bubble to make it into a starting role in right field.  Newcomer MJ Melendez is already hitting .364 with a couple of home runs.  Fellow necomer Mike Tauchman is hitting a solid .286.  Familiar sub outfielder Tyrone Taylor is hitting an unexpected .273.  Will any of them be able to sustain these numbers?  It’s unlikely but the great unknown may take place because the alternative is still fairly raw as an everyday hitter.

Carson Benge has been touted as a possible right field solution after playing below the Mendoza line against AAA pitching in 100 ABs in 2025.  This year in preseason he’s hitting a much more impressive .306.  Is he ready to face major league pitching full time or is he feasting on fringe prospect pitchers who are not going to see the light of a major league day?  He is most definitely a solution for the future but the question remains if the future is now.

Finally, in the realm of “What have you done for me lately?” Mark Vientos was off to a weak start with just a pair of hits after starting off the preseason 0-10.  That’s pretty bad.  You know what’s worse?  Brett Baty is still hitless yet no one even whispers about it.  It’s still early for both of them but having each had one good and multiple bad seasons neither are going to be written in ink as sure things until they deliver better.