Recently, Robinson Cano has been missing from camp for an undisclosed reason. Now, it’s possible by the time you read this that Cano has returned and everything is a-ok. But as it’s 2020 and nothing seems to go as one might expect, there’s the possibility that things are less than rosy. What follows is purely a theoretical exercise. What would the Mets do if Cano was to follow the lead of other veterans like Ian Desmond, Buster Posey and Ryan Zimmerman and opt out of the 2020 season?
Right now, Cano is set to be the team’s starting second baseman and it’s likely he would see some time at DH, too. Health permitting, Cano figured to get in the neighborhood of 55 starts and despite what you may think of his being on the team at all, it would create problems trying to replace that many starts at the drop of the hat.
The good news is that because of their depth, the Mets would have multiple options on how they would go about replacing him. The biggest wildcard would be the health of Jed Lowrie. If Lowrie was ready to go, the Mets could simply insert Lowrie as the starting second baseman and pretty much call it a day. But there are serious doubts that Lowrie is ready to handle that kind of load. The good news is that at last look, Lowrie ripped a double off Jacob deGrom in a sim game. The bad news is no one has any idea how much his leg will allow him to play in 2020.
If Lowrie is a partial answer, or no answer at all, the next thing would be to decide how many positions you would want to tinker with the solve the second base problem. It might be tempting to move Jeff McNeil back to second base but then that creates a hole at third base. You would move J.D. Davis to third but then that would open a spot in left field. Assuming Cespedes is your main DH, who would play left field in this scenario?
Would you look to get Dominic Smith’s bat in the lineup on a regular basis and hope that he would show some improvement defensively? Let’s be honest – it’s not like Davis was a defensive whiz out there. If Smith could hit like he did early in 2019, it would be a nice boost to have him in the lineup on a regular basis. But Smith’s early-season hot streak was certainly BABIP aided. Yet if we again look at 2019 Davis, he enjoyed a .355 BABIP last year, too.
Or would you look to put the best defensive outfield you could out there, by moving Brandon Nimmo from center field to left and installing Jake Marisnick as the starter in center? No doubt this will be a popular option among many people, at least until they see Marisnick in the batter’s box, where he might very well make us long for Juan Lagares to be there, instead.
And if it’s defense that you want, why not just install Luis Guillorme at second base and do away with shifting all of the other guys? That way, both Davis and McNeil get to play the positions they’ve expected and prepared for since the end of last season. Guillorme is not much of an offensive threat, either, but he’s the age where he might improve while Marisnick is the age where he’s likely to decline from his previous woeful output.
It’s tough for me to advocate for any of these options outside of a healthy Lowrie. It would be easier if there was a feeling that Davis would be less of a liability defensively at either third base or left field. If forced to pick, my choice would be to shift McNeil to 2B, play Davis at 3B and Smith in LF, all with the idea to substitute Guillorme and/or Marisnick into the game if the Mets have a close lead late.
Guillorme has a .789 OPS in the sim over at Baseball Reference while Marisnick has a .662 OPS
In my simulation, Guillorme is 0-100 with 100Ks while Cano tripped and fell while trying to inject himself with more PEDs and killed himself when the needle stabbed his heart.
ROFLMAO
Name,
That is just way too far fetched…
Guillorme would get at least 5 hits in 100 AB.
Thanks Brian for highlighting the defensive shortcomings of our team. If Cano opts out and we don’t have to pay him this season, I’d say that’s a plus. Can never understand why you can’t teach someone to play a better left field so that we don’t have to hold our breath when JD is out there. The hot corner needs such strong reflexes and McNeil fits that bill. If Ces can play we became so much more dangerous in outscoring other teams. How in the world can Lowrie still be wearing a brace?
Any news on any Mets looking to opt out.
Assume for the moment Cano is out, JD @3B, McNeil @ 2B.
Alonso, Dom S. & Cespedes are in the line up. What’s the best 1B, LF, DH combo?
Brian Dozier is suddenly available
I’d like to have a look at a major-league level defensive outfield, at least once in a while. I think Cespedes, especially when you consider his arm, is a plus left fielder (if he can run). Nimmo, is a good player but ought to be in left. Conforto is average. Playing Marisnik in center, with the lead in close games and moving Nimmo to left in those games gives the Mets an outfield that was above average defensively.
The Mets infield is below Average defensively in most of its configurations. McNeil has not proved that he is an average third baseman. Rosario is till inconsistent, but I would rate him average at this point. Cano was good once, but his range has narrowed. He is sub average. Alonso is working on raising his rating to average. On the bench there is Smith who is +, Guillorme who is +, Gimenez (if he makes the team) who is also + defensively.
In the end, this gives me a headache. Two many good hitters who can’t field or are blocked (e.g., Smith). Too many good fielders who can’t hit.
Solution: The solution is not shuffling the cards and playing different configurations for different situations. That’s just shifting the deckchairs around. The solution is something called “trading.” Trade Davis and Smith, both good hitters, for an all-around good center fielder., maybe even a AAA player. McNeil stays at third. Maybe Gimenez does some work at second, sharing it with Gimenez if Cano is done. Nimmo in left. Cespedes as DH. Conforto in right.
So, second might be manned by a relatively weak hitter, but if you look at that potential lineup, hitting is not what we need. A decent defense, especially up the middle, would help the Mets to several extra wins.
It’s all well and good to propose trading as a solution. But list me all of the “all-around good center fielders” that get traded. Generally, the only CF who get traded are the ones like Marisnick, who can’t hit.
FanGraphs lists 8 guys as CF last year who were average or better and one of them is Brett Gardner, who is less of a CF than Nimmo at this point of his career. One of these guys did get traded – Starling Marte. The problem is that the price for the Mets was higher than it was for other teams. And the other problem is that Marte isn’t a good defensive CF. He had a (-7.6 UZR) and a (-9) DRS last year in CF. And at age 31, it’s unlikely he’s going to become a good defensive player.
Since teams generally don’t trade good all-around good center fielders, you’ve got to make it a priority to draft and develop them. It’s another reason trading Kelenic was such a disappointment. Hopefully PCA develops into one.
I think a 60 game season is the ultimate crapshoot so why woukd you trade anyone? A good defender could start out “hot” and not “cool” down until a quarter or more of the season was almost over.