Baseball can be full of surprises. Heck, I said myself a couple of weeks ago that the Washington Nationals are playing in a weak NL East division. Though, albeit only 18 games in, the New York Mets are in first place in that same division, with the Phillies being in second and the Braves in third.
How are the Mets doing it so far? This is a team that had 92 losses in 2017. How can they make such a turnaround from one year to the next? What aspects of the game have they excelled in to get them to an early season lead in the division?
One thing that has done well is their offence. They are currently tied for 9th in the majors in runs scored. The team that they’re tied with is the defending champion Houston Astros, who are known for their powerhouse offence. A big contributing factor to their run production is they have been very adept at reaching base, with a team OBP currently 6th in the majors (.335).Offseason acquisition Todd Frazier is off to a red-hot start, hitting .293/.434/.534 in his 18 games played. His On-Base-Plus-Slugging of .969 is good for third in MLB amongst qualifying third basemen. Veteran SS Asdrubal Cabrera has been hot as well, hitting .343/.377/.600 with 16 runs scored in 18 games. Yoenis Cespedes has also tallied 17 RBI in the first 18 games.
A few of their pitchers have also had strong starts. Noah Syndergaard is 2-0 with a 2.95 ERA in 4 starts, and Jacob Degrom has sported a 2-0 record with a 3.24 ERA. Closer Jeurys Familia has yet to give up a run in 10 appearances, including 7 saves. 2017 midseason acquisition AJ Ramos is also allowing a minuscule .083 batting average against thus far.
Now, what do the Mets have to do to stave off their competition in their division? Frazier is unlikely to keep his batting average where it is, as he has hit .225 and .213 in his last two seasons. Ditto for Asdrubal Cabrera, who’s previous career high for batting average was .308 and that was way back in 2009 while playing for Cleveland. Though if those two can avoid an excessive drop-off in production going forward, and Jay Bruce can wake up from his early slump (.190 AVG, 1 HR), then they should still be able to plate enough runs to keep winning games. Bruce is usually as safe a bet as they come offensively, hitting at least 25+ HR and tallying at least 85+ RBI in 6 of the last 7 seasons, so one can reasonably expect him to snap out of it.
What would help this further is the performance of their rotation. If Matt Harvey can shake off a rough start (0-2, 6.00 ERA), that would take some of the burden off the offence. Also, Syndergaard (career 2.90 ERA) and DeGrom (career 2.98 ERA) are proven arms at the top of the rotation, so we can expect them to continue to perform at a high level. Zach Wheeler and Steven Matz have also shown flashes of brilliance when healthy. Those five make up a starting rotation that has a ton of upside and that a lot of teams would like to have.
In short, the Mets have gotten off to a hot start. Though, in order for them not to flame out and end up back in the middle of the pack, a few things need to happen. They have positioned themselves well so far, let’s see how they keep it together over the course of a long season.
Stats from MLB.com
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