When Travis d’Arnaud was injured and wound up out for the season, few people were surprised. The timing could not have been worse for the Mets who lost Kevin Plawecki to another injury and have not gotten him back as of yet. This sent Sandy Alderson to the bargain basement looking for spare parts and, ignoring the obvious candidate named Miguel Montero, he traded the former Met Ace, Matt Harvey, for Devin Mesoraco. Turns out Tomas Nido and Jose Lobaton were not up to the task of performing as major league regulars.
We can chalk this up to a few things. For one, neither player was hitting. The Mets catchers had become more of an automatic out than the pitcher’s spot in the lineup. For another, the Met catchers are seemingly all incapable of throwing out runners. Looking down into the minors, things don’t get much better either, though there is a glimmer of hope.
The Mets highest ceiling catching prospect is named Patrick Mazeika. I rank his ceiling above Nido’s because of his offensive profile and ability to get on base being very advanced. Sadly, dear readers, he is not a defensive catcher.
While he’s been good enough defensively to hold onto the position up through AA, the scouting on Mazeika universally states “He will be carried by his bat”. Throughout his minor league career his bat has produced solid batting averages, reasonably good on base percentages and slightly anemic slugging numbers.
In 2017 Mazeika managed 7 home runs and 26 doubles between A+ and AA ball. During those 106 games he had a number of slumps but finished with an acceptable .290/.389/.416 batting line and you’d better believe the Mets would accept a catcher with an .800 OPS around now.
2018 began with a slump but over the past four games, he’s broken out of it in a major way. Through 26 games he’s got 3 doubles and 6 home runs and three of those dingers come in the last four games. His batting average in uncharacteristically sitting at .242 but with 12 walks and 13 strikeouts his eye seems to still be intact which gives me hope for the batting average climbing.
To give the reader more hope, he’s also thrown out 11 of the 28 runners who have tried to steal a bag against him. There is reason to hope for a Plawecki/Mazeika platoon in 2019 but we are still getting ahead of ourselves.
AAA:
Bryce Brentz made more sense than Dominic Smith – With Smith having gotten only 1 at bat in the majors I wonder why the Mets chose to promote him in place of Brentz.
Cody Asche having a productive journeyman year – The former Phil is having a strong year for Vegas and could see another stint in the majors this season.
Tim Peterson still looks better than Hansel Robles – That’s just my opinion apparently.
AA:
Peter Alonso still mashing – His OPS is still safely above 1.000 and this is after a mini-slump.
Jeff McNeil is ready for AAA – Add to this that he’s 26 but McNeil has a longstanding hitting streak and has nothing left to prove in AA.
Here comes Jhoan Urena – He’s hit .350 over his past 10 games, has his batting average up to .276 and is slugging fairly well.
Tim Tebow… stuff – Sure he’s hit .333 over his past 10 games but the guy strikes out way too much. Aaron Judge, he is not.
Andrew Church’s best outing – Solid 6.1 IP outing for the righty. Hopefully he backs it up with another soon.
Marcos Molina isn’t showing us enough – We’ve carried hopes for Molina for a while but I think his time to make good on his promise is coming nigh.
David Roseboom getting on track – He’s pitching well for Binghamton which should get him back to Las Vegas soon.
A+:
Andres Gimenez needs to hit – The strikeouts are under control but he needs to put bat to ball.
Desmond Lindsay may be a dud – Hope for this high pick may be running thin.
A:
Scott Manea looks to be real deal – He’s pretty distant but is showing off a good bat as a catcher.
Ali Sanchez shows signs of life – We’ll see if he can keep it up.
David Peterson’s “Ace” outing – 7.0 IP, 3 Hits, 0 ER, 1 BB, 8 K is what Peterson should be showing us at this level.
Two things I find encouraging about Mazeika so far – first, he’s hitting better on the road than at home and second, he’s got a significantly low BABIP.
Mets weren’t going to make a 40-man roster move for a guy to be in the majors less than a week and Bentz wasn’t on the 40.
After a dreadful start, Lindsay is starting to show signs of life. He has a .245/.383/.367 line in his last 14 games, with 11 BB and 9 Ks.
And Tebow – wow, 4 multi-hit games this month already. Good things happen when he makes contact but those strikeouts are an issue.
I’m gonna make you a Mazeika believer. I’ve been trying to convert you for two years now.
Don’t hold your breath on that one. I’m very suspicious of BNG stats and there’s still the question if he’s good enough defensively to cut it as a C in MLB. But if he does make it you will definitely have earned the right to brag about it.
My hope is that he rakes and is desirable as a trade chit at the deadline.
Yes the K rate is absurdly high for Tebow but he’s putting up a wRC+ around 130, which is very impressive given he’s barely played baseball in a decade. Oh and Brentz is hurt and he’s not on the 40 man anyway so he wasn’t gonna he added for a three day stint.
Didn’t Brentz get hurt already anyway?Tebow is in AA ,Cespedes has struck out what 50 times in 152 PAs up in the bigs.Ouch.
Braves and Phillies of this year remind me of the Mets and Cubs from 2015 when everyone thought they were a year away from being playoff teams, and both teams won 90+ games and faced off in the nlcs.
They won 90 by feeding on the caller dwellers in their divisions. It won’t be that way for the upstarts of the NL East, but their trajectories are upwards while the Mets…
Gotta put this up:
Peter Alonso has 2 home runs in a 3 for 5 outing.
Jeff McNeil stays hot with a dinger of his own.
Juan Urena ups his average to .286