Mets Series in Review: @Orioles

Last Series

Dates: August 18-19, 2015

Results: Split 2

W 5-3, L 5-4

Current Record: 64-56

MVMet: Daniel Murphy.

LVMet: Carlos Torres.

Statistics

Mets Series in Review: @Pirates

Last Series

Dates: May 22-24, 2015

Results: Swept L

L 4-1, L 8-2, L 9-1

Current Record: 24-21, 2.5 Games behind Washington

MVMet: I guess the Mets middle infield can share this award, as Wilmer Flores and Daniel Murphy combined to go 9-19 in Pittsburgh, providing half of the position players hits.

LVMet: Everybody else? I’m giving it to Matt Harvey, because he’s whatever Gotham needs him to be. Now, can Mets fans have their faith rewarded?

Statistics

Mets Series in Review: vs. Brewers

Mets finally got some of what Eric Campbell's been having out in Las Vegas

Last Series

Dates: May 16-19, 2015

Results: Win 2 out of 3

L 7-0, W 14-1, W 5-1

Current Record: 22-16, 0.5 Games ahead of Washington

MVMet: There are several options, because when the offense came, it was spread pretty evenly to all, but I’m giving it to the Soup whose arrival coincided with the huge outburst – “Waiter, I’ll have whatever Soup they’re having.”

LVMet: The ‘people who make decisions’ get this award for letting the Mets roll with a bench that’s been doing nothing all year. I’m generally a big fan of this front office, so this isn’t just me lashing out against Sandy again, because this bench has stunk so far, and the Mets might at least have better options in AAA. It’s not like the offensive bar has been set high: Ruben Tejada has a 57 wRC+, John Mayberry has a 23 wRC+, and Kirk Nieuwenhuis has a -26 wRC+ (!!!!).

Statistics

Mets Series in Review: vs. Orioles

Last Series

Dates: 5/5-5/6

Results: SWEEP 2!

 W 3-2, W 5-1

Current Record: 18-10, 1^st, place, 4 Games over Atlanta

                                                       4.5 Games over Miami/Washington

MVMet: After losing a tough series against Washington this past weekend, Bartolo Colon took a scoreless game into the 8^th, and just continued his early season dominance. He has been a joy for all to watch, unless he’s pitching against your favorite team.

LVMet: David Wright’s back? Nah, it held up the Mets offense for so many years. Just get healthy quick Dubz!

Statistics

Mets Series in Review: @Marlins

Don't let a couple of losses get you down, the Mets still have a comfortable 1st place lead!

Last Series

Dates: April 27-29

Results: L 2/3

 W 3-1, L 4-3, L 7-3

Current Record: 15-7, 4.5 Game lead over Atlanta (6 over Washington)

MVMet: Daniel Murphy has had a slow start to the season. Dilson Herrera and Matt Reynolds have been red hot. The questions about his job security were beginning, and Murph answered with his best series at the plate yet.

LVMet: Wilmer Flores has been better at the plate lately, but a 1-9 still hurts, especially from a player in the game for his bat.

Statistics

The Three-Team Race in the NL East

Photo made by @MEDIAGOON at MetsPolice

The Nationals are the favorite pick to win the NL East, but there should be a real race between the top 3 teams in the division. Comparing the 3 teams starters in a position-by-position breakdown.

            The NL East is an interesting division this year, as there should be 3 teams fighting at the top of the division standings and for a playoff spot, and 2 teams fighting for last place in the major league standings. The division could end up with 3 playoff teams and the top 2 picks in the 2016 draft. The Mets, Marlins and Nationals will each get 38 games against the Braves and Phillies this season (more than 20% of the seasons total games), so they will have plenty of opportunities to boost their records beating up on inferior talent. Of course, the Mets, Marlins and Nationals will be battling each other just as often, so the final NL East standing will likely come down to how these teams do against each other. For this comparison, I will use 2015 Fangraphs depth chart projections.

C

Team	Player	PA	Slash	wRC+	fWAR
Mets	Travis d’Arnaud	480	.257/.293/.434	112	2.5
Marlins	Jarrod Saltalamacchia	448	.228/.305/.390	94	1.4
Nationals	Wilson Ramos	448	.268/.314/.439	109	2.9

            Considering we’re dealing with projections, it makes sense to start this 3-team comparison looking at those players who don the tools of ignorance. Since the league average catcher had a 94 wRC+ in 2014, all 3 teams are likely to get at least average offense from the position. The Mets have the edge by wRC+, and we all know TdA is one of the best pitch framers in the league, but the rest of his defensive game gets knocked, so he takes a hit in fWAR. Since fWAR doesn’t consider pitch framing yet, it’s likely undervaluing TdA’s contribution a little.

Rank: Push between TdA and Ramos, Salty 3^rd

Is the 2015 Mets Roster More Sandy’s ‘Mess’ or Omar’s?

Which GM is giving the Mets the bigger punch in 2015?

Comparing the expected impact of Omar-era players with those brought in during the Sandy-era.

            A common meme on #MetsTwitter is to describe either a positive or negative Mets development and add either #SandysMess or #OmarsMess to the end of the tweet, as if everything that happens to this club is the fault of one of those two GM’s. It seems like the joke should have died down by now, as this will be Sandy Alderson’s 5^th season as the Mets GM, but the roster still has a big imprint of former GM Omar Minaya, which is kind of surprising. Although Sandy makes the final decision about who stays on the 40-man roster, only 18 of those players were brought in (or back) by Sandy Alderson – Wright was resigned by Sandy, so he’s grouped into #SandysMess – with the rest tracing their roots to the Omar regime. To get a better idea of which GM’s ‘mess’ will have the bigger impact on the 2015 Mets, I’ve split the 40-man roster into two groups below, and included Steamer and ZiPS projections.

Muno Makes Sense on the Mets Bench

Will Danny Muno be Sandy Alderson's first Mets draft pick to debut?

It appears likely that Danny Muno will head North with the Mets out of camp if Daniel Murphy is not ready, which has caused some controversy among Mets fans who think Matt Reynolds should get the nod. But does Muno have a case for the bench regardless of whether Murph can go?

            Daniel Muno might not have been on the radar of many Mets fans or beat reporters coming into Spring Training, and he didn’t make many prospect lists over the winter, but he’s been one of the hottest topics of discussion as the Mets finalize their roster. I had him at #30 on my top 83 prospects series, under the category of “Future ‘impact’ utility infielders,” and said “I’d be surprised if we don’t see him in Queens at some point this year” – I just didn’t expect it so early in the year. Since Daniel Murphy is still not running with a week left in camp, it's likely the Mets will need another middle infielder for at least the first 6 days of the season, and sources suggest the Mets prefer Muno to Reynolds. Many fans would prefer the Mets choose Matt Reynolds, who is a younger and better prospect, but who management wants to see him playing everyday somewhere. Regardless of whether Murphy is ready, or Reynolds is given a week at 2B to start the season, Muno has made a strong argument that he can be an impactful bat on the Mets bench. Of course spring stats are always to be taken with a grain of salt, and his .400+ BABIP isn’t going to stay this high during the regular season, but other than the high BABIP, this spring has basically just been Muno doing his thing – strong K: BB and an average-ish ISO. This isn’t even the hottest I've seen Muno, as he maintained a ~.250 ISO for ~150 PA in the middle of 2014 with Las Vegas, and finished the season with a .207 ISO over his last 268 PA there.

Comparing Individual Mets 2014 BABIP and xBABIP

            At this point in the season (offseason?), there aren’t many new topics to discuss until the games finally start. The biggest news story to break in Mets spring training camp so far is that Lucas Duda has been dealing with a slight left intercostals/oblique strain from overworking this offseason. While that doesn’t sound serious right now, it’ll be very important that Duda gets passed that issue before the season starts. While I was looking for other interesting Mets news on twitter today – and tweeting out some fun David Wright #FaceOfMLB votes – I ran across an interesting tweet from ESPN’s Mark Simon. The tweet highlighted the following information:

Table 1 – Results by batted ball type from 2014

Batted Ball Type	AVG	ISO	BABIP	tOPS+*
Ground Balls	.248	.021	.248	49
Fly Balls	.153	.285	.079	61
Line Drives	.659	.338	.637	366
Bunts	.404	.000	.404	133

*tOPS+ is the OPS for the split relative to a player’s total OPS

            While this information isn’t particularly new, it got me thinking about how the current Mets fared in terms of BABIP in 2014. BABIP isn’t particularly a new concept, and if you like advanced stats even just a little, you probably have a rough idea of either how most Mets fared in terms of 2014 BABIP, or at least which players outperformed/underperformed league average BABIP expectations. Even though league average BABIP has been pretty steady over the past 10 years, individual players BABIP can vary quite a lot from season to season, and so analysts have come up with various formulas for an expected BABIP formula (xBABIP). After some fairly simple xBABIP equations initially, these xBABIP calculations have evolved to take into account more factors than are sometimes even available to the casual fan. For example, Jeff Zimmerman at Rotographs introduced one that uses Inside Edge data and player speeds. I collected the relevant xBABIP information for the 2015 Mets and compiled them into Table 2.

Table 2 – Comparing Mets 2014 BABIP and xBABIP

Name	PA	xBABIP2014*	BABIP2014	dBABIP**
Curtis Granderson	654	.297	.265	-0.032
Daniel Murphy	642	.310	.322	0.012
Lucas Duda	596	.314	.283	-0.031
David Wright	586	.290	.325	0.035
Juan Lagares	452	.297	.341	0.044
Travis d'Arnaud	421	.289	.259	-0.030
Ruben Tejada	419	.267	.283	0.016
Wilmer Flores	274	.285	.265	-0.020
Eric Campbell	211	.283	.348	0.065
Michael Cuddyer	205	.320	.351	0.031
Anthony Recker	189	.284	.267	-0.017
Matt den Dekker	174	.292	.322	0.030
John Mayberry	168	.248	.229	-0.019
Kirk Nieuwenhuis	130	.356	.361	0.005
Dilson Herrera	66	.281	.256	-0.025

*xBABIP values from this Fangraphs piece

** dBABIP = BABIP - xBABIP