Ed Delany/MMO

Dominic Smith has been a revelation this year in Spring Training, looking like a completely different player than the one the team saw previously and appears to be finally becoming the player the Mets they thought they drafted 11th overall in 2013.

While it is only Spring Training, Smith is hitting .500/.565/.700 with one home run and six runs batted in.

Of course, Smith is not going to hit .500 in the regular season, but there is a significant reason to believe that he might be turning a corner as detailed by Deesha Thosar of the New York Daily News.

That reason is that Smith has overcome his struggles with sleep apnea which forced him to play games tired on a consistent basis. It affected him so much so that he was perceiving the ball as faster than it actually was.

“What I would perceive as a 103 mph fastball would actually be 95 (mph).” The 23-year-old went onto say that he      “(comes) to the ballpark feeling good” and “(has) more energy now.”

Smith is currently competing with Pete Alonso for the Opening Day first job, with a spot on the roster for the former looking very likely with both Jed Lowrie (left knee capsule sprain) and Todd Frazier (left oblique strain) dealing with injuries that might keep them out past Opening Day.

Another factor working in Smith’s favor is the fact that the Mets can gain an extra year of control for Alonso if they send him down until mid-April. While Brodie Van Wagenen has stated numerous times that he would bypass the extra year of control if Alonso plays well in Spring Training, Smith’s excellence performance so far would give the team a much better excuse to send him down to Triple-A Syracuse to start the year.

Alonso, 24, is also having a very good Spring so far, hitting .412/.474/.882 with two homers and five runs batted in.

Smith also has Alonso beat in two other areas as his glove is much better than the latter’s and he is already on the 40-man roster while Alonso would have to be added, which would mean the team would have to remove someone in turn.

While the last issue could be resolved by simply placing Yoenis Cespedes and/or Franklyn Kilome on the 60-day DL, the team might prefer to use those spots for other transactions such as adding Luis Avilan to the 40-man roster as he has excelled early in Spring Training. Rajai Davis, Devin Mesoraco, and Hector Santiago are other players that could be added to the roster as well.

Whatever the case, this is a good problem to have. The team has two players at the first base position that appear to be capable options for the 2019 roster and competition often brings the best out of players.