Mets looking for bats to come alive in home opener Friday
Mets players look on from the dugout during an MLB game against the Brewers on Wednesday at American Family Field in Milwaukee. Credit: Icon Sportswire via Getty Images/Icon Sportswire
The Mets’ aggressive postponement of their home opener, from 1:10 p.m. Thursday to the same time Friday against the Marlins, a decision made nearly 24 hours in advance, was a fortunate call for those on the field.
They opened the year with games on seven consecutive days, an unusual arrangement, and lost four of them. They looked largely listless during a mess in Milwaukee, a sweep by an aggregate score of 26-6. And they arrived in New York — after seven weeks in Florida and three days in Wisconsin — late Wednesday night, then would have had all of several hours at the respective homes they hadn’t been to in months, if ever, before turning around and going back to the ballpark for an afternoon game and the pomp and circumstance that accompanies the occasion.
What’s that? A chance of rain, maybe major rain, later in the day? Eh, don’t want to take any chances with what is supposed to be a happy day, right? So around the time of the would-be first pitch, when the Citi Field sky was partially cloudy on an otherwise delightful spring afternoon, the Mets were scattered, doing whatever they wanted on a bona fide off day.
Maybe the rest will help them hit.
“We’re going to put up more runs as an offense,” Pete Alonso said Wednesday afternoon, after the 15th multi-homer game of his career wasn’t enough for the Mets to win. “We’re going to continue to get better and better as the season goes on. We know we can play better. We know what our potential can be.”
The Mets did not play to their potential on their first road trip, totaling 23 runs in seven games — an average of 3.3 runs per game, well below their 4.8 mark from last season with largely the same lineup.
Heading into play Thursday, the Mets ranked 27th out of 30 teams with a .208 average, 19th with a .311 OBP and 27th with a .323 slugging percentage.
Alonso has hit three of their five home runs. Mark Canha and Tommy Pham have one each; nobody else has any.
All of the usual small-sample-size caveats apply. Francisco Lindor and Alonso showed Wednesday how much one good game can make the early-season numbers look much better. Manager Buck Showalter said repeatedly this week that he was sure his players with track records of success of hitting in the majors would indeed do so eventually, probably soon.
Nonetheless, here is a quick look at some of the Mets’ primary offensive offenders.
Brandon Nimmo: .238 average, .393 OBP, .286 slugging percentage. He is drawing plenty of walks (six, opposite two strikeouts) but only one extra-base hit (a double). It seems like only a matter of time before the average and slug rise.
Starling Marte: .280/.333/.360. That is far from the worst of the bunch, but the Mets expect and need better from their No. 2 hitter who was an All-Star in 2022.
Jeff McNeil: .250/.276/.286. The defending batting champ has three strikeouts and zero walks.
Canha: .160/.276/.320. He hasn't done much of anything outside of one big game in Miami last weekend.
Eduardo Escobar: .100/.143/.100. With the worst numbers of them all, Escobar got benched for two of three games in Milwaukee. Brett Baty staying hot with Triple-A Syracuse would put pressure on the Mets to make a change.
Omar Narvaez and Tomas Nido (combined): .174/.231/.174. All four of their hits have been singles. The Mets didn’t expect much offensively from their catcher duo entering the season, but they should get more than this.
Might a strong showing (six runs in 4 1/3 innings) against an excellent pitcher (2021 NL Cy Young Award winner Corbin Burnes) on Wednesday jumpstart the lineup?
“I hope so. I hope so,” Lindor said. “I hope [Friday] as an offense we can come back and put together ABs and pass the baton, not try to be the big guy. Kind of what we did today. Feeding off each other, helping each other out.”
Tim Healey is the Mets beat writer for Newsday. Born on Long Island and raised in Connecticut, Tim has previously worked for the South Florida Sun Sentinel, the Boston Globe and MLB.com. He is also the author of “Hometown Hardball,” a book about minor league baseball in the northeast.
