A bright spot to Friday night’s 5-2 Mets loss to the Dodgers was Jose Bautista, who stayed hot with a two-run home run.
After Asdrubal Cabrera and Wilmer Flores made for the first two outs in the bottom of the sixth, Michael Conforto singled and brought Joey Bats to the dish.
Bautista took control of opposing pitcher Alex Wood’s fastball and parked it into the seats in left field.
“Hopefully got a couple more [home runs] coming,” Bautista said. “I don’t think there’s anything special going on just yet.”
The 37-year-old has six doubles, one home run, nine RBI, nine runs scored and a .438 OBP in 28 games with the Mets. He has reached base at a .632 clip in his last seven games (reached in 12 of 19 PA), including eight walks in that span, and has now reached base safely in his last eight contests.
Bautista has been a pleasant surprise for New York this year. After struggling with the Atlanta Braves earlier this season, he came into tonight at 0.5 WAR with the Mets in 27 games. And with his long ball, Bautista now has 334 career home runs, one behind Darryl Strawberry for 104th on the all-time list.
Besides Todd Frazier and Anthony Swarzak to a lesser extent because he’s been hurt, every Mets signing this offseason turned out to be a total flop.
Here’s how the rest have stacked up: Adrian Gonzalez -0.5 WAR, Jose Reyes -0.7 WAR, Jay Bruce -0.9 WAR and Jason Vargas -1.0 WAR.
At first, signing Bautista who had a rough 2017 campaign and started this year off slow, seemed like another fruitless move by the Mets, but he’s actually proved to be a contributor.
Overall, Bautista is hitting .243/.438/.415 with the Mets and has two defensive runs saved (DRS) in the outfield. Not too shabby at all.
With Bruce out and Yoenis Cespedes sidelined until who knows when, Bautista has earned a shot to start everyday along with Conforto and Brandon Nimmo.
