Just Mets

Throughout most of the season, the Mets offense has struggled mightily on a daily basis. Here’s a glance at the Mets offense through the first 44 games:

• The Mets have 337 hits this season, 239 of which are singles. That’s 70.9% – the 4th highest rate in Major League Baseball.
• 10% of the Mets hits are home runs, the 10th lowest rate in baseball.
• The Mets have hit just 34 home runs this season, 6th fewest in baseball, have 60 doubles, scored 161 runs with 85 weighted runs created and a .300 OBP, all of which are the 4th worst in baseball.
• Their .354 slugging percentage is the worst mark in baseball, and their four triples and .235 team batting average are the third worst in baseball.
• The Mets have grounded into 39 doubles plays – including eight in the last three games – the fourth most in the game.
• The Mets have scored three runs or fewer in 18 of its last 25 games.
• Overall the Mets have scored three runs or less 25 times this season, tied for the most in the majors with the Phillies. The Mets are 7-18 when scoring three or fewer runs.

The weird thing is, the Mets have the fourth highest line drive rate in the game, which means they’re definitely hitting into some bad luck. However, when it’s prolonged the way it has been for the Mets, its hard to directly conclude its entirely luck-related.

The problem is, they don’t hit for enough power to compensate for the bad luck, and have hit into way too many double plays on top of that. Part of that is the fact they have no team speed whatsoever, and that only compounds their singles-hitting offense, as they’re too station-to-station, requiring three and sometimes four hits to plate a single run. That results in too many opportunities to hit into double plays, and too many runners left on base.

The sad reality is, given who is on the roster right now and the kinds of hitters they are, this is all very unlikely to change dramatically.

Originally posted Sunday, May 24, 2015 at 9:30 am