Mets Player Performance Meter: Position players, August 11-17

From a hitting perspective, the Mets’ bats finally broke out this week. Offensively, the Mets did enough to win both series they played in this week, but unfortunately when things are not going a team’s way, often when one facet gets back on track, another becomes derailed. We’ll get to that in the pitching meter. But this meter at least looks much better this week. What stands out is that the “Fab Four” all have positive grades this week, which is generally the Mets’ recipe for success. Francisco

Lindor in particular did a 180 this week, going from ice cold to raging hot with the bat.

Player	Last week	This week
Francisco Alvarez, C
Pete Alonso, 1B
Brett Baty, 2B/3B
Francisco Lindor, SS
Starling Marte, OF/DH
Ronny Mauricio, SS/3B
Jeff McNeil, 2B/OF
Cedric Mullins, OF
Brandon Nimmo, OF
Juan Soto, OF
Tyrone Taylor, OF		—
Luis Torrens, C
Mark Vientos, 3B

We’ll start with Francisco Lindor because he was mired in about as deep of a slump as you can imagine. And then suddenly, he wasn’t. Lindor hit .560 this week, racking up a whopping fourteen hits in just 28 plate appearances. Not surprisingly, that leads the team by a rather large margin. He also leads the team in runs scored (7) and wRC+ (356, whew). Lindor really turned it on in Thursday’s series finale against the Braves in which he went 3-for-4 with a home run, two runs scored, and a stolen base. He followed that up with a similar performance on Friday, going deep twice and driving in four runs, including hitting a go-ahead, two-run homer in the fourth. Those four RBIs represent just over half of his total for the week. With this incredible week, Lindor earns NL Player of the Week honors and an emphatic fireball in this week’s meter.

It’s the week of the Franciscos because Francisco Alvarez is our other fireball recipient this week. Alvarez would have been the star of Tuesday’s 13-5 victory that snapped the Mets’ long losing streak if it wasn’t for Pete Alonso’s historic day, but like Alonso, Alvarez also went deep twice. He drove in four runs and scored three runs in that game alone. Alvarez led the team in RBIs this week with nine and matches Lindor for the team lead in runs scored with seven. The Mets’ catcher posted a 320 wRC+ in what was one of his best offensive weeks of the entire season. Of course, it had to be marred by injury as the Mets anxiously await the results of today’s MRI on his thumb. If the news is not good, Luis Torrens will be playing a lot more. With Alvarez as hot as he is, Torrens hasn’t played much. He went hitless in two plate appearances this week.

It was a huge week for Pete Alonso, who became the franchise home run king on Tuesday and added a cherry on top by homering again in the same game. Alonso drove in three runs and scored three runs on Tuesday. In total, he scored four runs and drove in seven this week. Of his nine hits (which matches Alvarez for the second-most on the team behind Lindor), four went for extra bases. Overall, Alonso posted a blistering 194 wRC+ for the week.

Though he is not quite as hot as Lindor right now, Brandon Nimmo emerged from the poop emoji depths of last week with a 143 wRC+ in 28 plate appearances this week. It was his three-run homer in Tuesday’s game that put the Mets ahead for good and was a weight of his—and his team’s—shoulders. Overall, Nimmo racked up eight hits, scored five runs, and drove in four runs this week.

Juan Soto rounds out a strong week for the entire Fab Four with a 173 wRC+ in 28 plate appearances for the week. Though he had just five hits, he leads the team in walks by far with seven this week. Two of those five hits were home runs. One of those gave the Mets a 5-0 lead in Wednesday’s game that they would go on to blow. The other came in Friday’s ping-pong affair when he went back-to-back with Lindor in the fourth. Soto scored five runs and drove in four runs this week.

Mark Vientos is another player who turned his poop emoji into a positive grade with two hits in eight plate appearances this week. One of those hits was a three-run homer in yesterday’s Little League Classic, which gave the Mets some important insurance. That home run was responsible for three of his four RBIs for the week. He has seen his playing time diminish lately, but one of the only players who still truly looks lost at the plate right now is Ronny Mauricio, who had just two singles and a run scored in 11 plate appearances this week with six strikeouts.

Brett Baty has been the most consistent of the Mets’ third base options lately and he had a very good week, posting a 195 wRC+ in 18 plate appearances. He racked up seven hits. Only one of those went for extra bases—a home run in Tuesday’s bonanza. He scored three runs and drove in three runs in total this week.

The topline stats for Jeff McNeil look bad—a 77 wRC+ in 27 plate appearances. But he’s been hitting into some really hard outs lately. Even so, he did log six hits this week, two of which were doubles. He scored four runs, drove in a run, and also walked twice this week.

After a solid week last week, Cedric Mullins is down to an unimpressive .167/.192/.292 batting line this week. It may be hard to remember since the Mets went on to score so many runs, but it was Mullins’ RBI single that tied the game in the second inning on Tuesday and got things started for the Mets. That was one of two runs batted in for Mullins this week. He also walked twice and scored four runs. Outside of Tuesday’s RBI hit, all three of his other hits this week were doubles. Since the arrival of Mullins, Tyrone Taylor has barely played and is mostly a defensive replacement/pinch runner at the moment. He appeared in one game this week, but did not log any plate appearances.

Starling Marte spends his second straight week in the green with a 153 wRC+ in 11 plate appearances. Marte amassed four hits—all singles. He also walked once, but did not score any runs or drive in any runs this week.