Early last month we wrote about some select Mets prospects that the team had been uncharacteristically aggressive in promoting to start the 2015 season. It was uncharacteristic in the sense that the team has generally been somewhat conservative with many of their prospects under General Manager Sandy Alderson’s regime. It’s unclear whether it was a reversal in approach to managing the farm or simply the result of decision making on a prospect-by-prospect basis, but the safe bet is probably the latter.
The Hi-A St. Lucie Mets were the main recipients of the somewhat aggressive placement of a group of the team’s top prospects. Right-handed pitcher Marcos Molina, shortstop Amed Rosario, third baseman Jhoan Urena, and outfielder Michael Conforto started the 2015 season on St. Lucie’s roster after spending 2014 on the short-season Class-A Brooklyn Cyclones. Bypassing Low-A Savannah was a surprise for all but Conforto, who’s showing the team was probably actually a bit conservative in not starting him at Double-A.
Conforto, the Mets’ first-round pick and 10th overall in 2014, has been demolishing Florida State League pitching. While he’s cooled off a bit recently, he’s slashing .299/.380/.540. He’s knocked six homers with 19 RBI in 22 games while OPSing over .900. His strikeouts are a tad high, but he’s also walking a lot. In short, he’s probably ready to make the jump to Double-A Binghamton.
Molina hasn’t been quite as dominant as he was in Brooklyn last year, but he seems to be making the transition successfully for the most part. In four starts he has a 3.27 ERA and 1.36 WHIP. He’s striking out slightly less while walking slightly more, but the real concern here is the amount of hits he’s given up so far. He’s allowed 9.8 hits per nine innings and batters are hitting .270 against him. The contact is something to keep an eye on, but there’s nothing overly concerning here at this point.
For Rosario and Urena, on the other hand, it’s been a bit of a struggle. Rosario is slashing a weak .250/.276/.333 through 21 games. That’s an OPS of .609. Additionally, his 16 strikeouts are paired with just a single walk in 88 plate appearances. The numbers are even worse for Urena, whose .188/.266/.275 triple slash suggests he is completely overmatched at this point. His awful batting average and 21 strikeouts in 84 plate appearances highlight just how much he’s been struggling to make contact on more advanced pitching.
A similar situation is developing in Low-A Savannah, where outfielders Wuilmer Becerra and Vicente Lupo started 2015 after skipping Brooklyn. Becerra’s struggling with a .239 BA and .289 OBP. He’s hitting with some power, though, with seven extra base hits (including 3 home runs). Like Urena, Lupo is finding the transition much more difficult. The .146/.222/.229 slash is bad enough, but the 20 strikeouts in just 54 plate appearances really speaks to his struggles to acclimate to a higher level of competition. That’s a 37% strikeout rate.
The obvious caveat here is that it’s still very early and a few hot weeks could level out these numbers. The problem is that, at least in the cases of Urena and Lupo, the numbers suggest they’re so overmatched that the climb back to even average production is a steep one.
Aggressive promotions can motivate a prospect to make the necessary refinements to take their game to the next level. It exposes weaknesses that may not have been apparent against lesser competition. It could also stifle the development of prospects if they’re treated too aggressively. Again, there’s still a ton of time to go this season and plenty of time for these players to make the necessary adjustments. They bear watching, though, as these are players with some of the highest upside in the Mets system.
With Becerra and Lupo, they both spent two full-season in short-season ball. Becerra actually played part of a third with the Blue Jays and Lupo played two full years in the DSL. I mean, if they weren’t ready for a full-season assignment at this point – they probably weren’t prospects.
And of course on the day you write this, both Rosario and Urena get two hits. Those were aggressive promotions and maybe the thinking was have them avoid the tough hitting environment in SAV.
To be fair, Becerra missed most of that first year with that fastball to the face. I would expect that to have derailed him a least a little bit. Lupo’s stock in plummeting fast, however.
Still so early and small sample size that results so far could be as much a slump as it is a transitional struggle. He is 22 games in, but over the last six, he is hitting .351 and OPSing about .963. That’s Rosario, so he is flashing a bit, but both are small sample sizes thus far. Need to wait until July 1 before evaluating whether or not they were rushed. I’m hoping to see the following top of the order for Bingo in the next few weeks:
Nimmo
Cecchini
Conforto