Photo by Chris Simon
A Fan Shot by Greg Jones
Since joining the Mets in 2019, J.D. Davis has the second highest batting average (behind Jeff McNeil), the second highest slugging percentage (behind Pete Alonso) and the second highest on-base percentage (behind Brandon Nimmo).
In the holiday spirit, I am reminded this week of George Bailey in “It’s A Wonderful Life” returning to Pottersville, an invisible soul unrecognized by his life-long friends. When did J.D. Davis become the invisible man??
Thousands of words have been written in the Mets blogosphere about the team’s options in a Designated Hitter World of 2022, should that emerge for the current negotiations. Dominic Smith some say, or the returning Robinson Cano, or even conversely, the reigning second baseman Jeff McNeil.
What the heck did Davis do to disappear from the radar of Mets fans? Yes, he did have an injury-prone 2021, all related to the sickening beaning on his left hand in the 8th game of the season. Immediately after the season Davis had hand surgery on his left hand and he will be at full strength when the team returns to the field.
Even while the injury sapped his power during, 45 games into the season he was still slashing .314/.417/.488/.904. Recall where the rest of our batters were then.
Being bounced around positions, corner infield and outfield and even pitching, before his first full season seared some ugly defensive memories in all our collective minds.
But were they worse than McNeil at third base, with five errors in nine games to start 2020 before being bounced in favor of J.D. (who had worked in left field all offseason)?
Was it worse than Dominic Smith in left field? The reality is, after 2019, JD played about a league average third base in terms of fielding percentage in 2020 and 2021, and was screwed by the deeply flawed fledgling Defensive Runs Saved statistic, which was dramatically revised by SIS last year, with the Mets as a team and Amed Rosario in particular as a player having been the most slandered in baseball. Oops, he got traded.
I gotta stop.
Stop, I have to tell myself right now. I will be bombarded by fans saying their learned eyes can tell J.D. is a horrible albatross to the Mets, stats be damned. To continue this discussion of defense, you can see my breakdown here.
We are here to discuss the designated hitter position, hopefully to emerge for the first full season in the National League. For two years, we have heard the book on JD Davis as “Good bat, but he is killing us in the field.”
JD is not a good bat. He is an elite bat. In the NL for the past three years, of batters over 800 plate appearances, JD is 12th in batting average and 10th in OBP. Only three batters appear in the top dozen on both those lists: Juan Soto, Freddie Freeman, and Ketel Marte. That is an MVP-1, and MVP-2 and an MVP-4 in that time frame.
Perspective. In JD’s first 162 games with the Mets he slashed .304/.374/.512/.886 with 25 home runs.
How often in the franchise’s history has a new Met hit for, say, a .300 average with 25 home runs and an .885 OPS in first 162 games with the team? Three times:
Mike Piazza, six-time All-Star and future Hall of Famer, topped those numbers when he came here in his seventh season in 1998. In 1996, Bernard Gilkey, a seven year vet, did it in 1996. Both of these accomplishments were in the highest run scoring environment to that point in National League history.
And then J.D., two decades later, in his *first* full major league season, strokes .304/.374/.512/.886 and his OPS of 1.078 at home was the best ever at Citi Field by a Met. Not by a rookie, not by a first year Met — any Met, and that includes David Wright and Rod Barajas.
2019 was not a fluke year….in 2018, JD won the Pacific Coast League batting championship with an average of .341 (note, Pete Alonso in the same league batted .260, and J.D. had a .988 OPS to Pete’s .941). In 2019, JD also shed any perception of being a platoon player, batting .305/.366/.520/.886 against righties and .312/.374/.539/.913 against southpaws. It is repeatedly said he could platoon with Dom Smith, who batted .218 against righties this year, to put a loincloth on Dom’s shortcomings. Why? J.D.’s career numbers against lefties are better than Dom’s anyway. Factoring in BABIP, JD’s career splits are nearly identical. He is a professional hitter.
So what does this bode for 2022’s DH? Production, of course, is first and foremost. But there are also names being thrown around among free agents and at free agent prices. While we are playing with Cohen bucks, you still can’t ignore $10 million or whatever a Nelson Cruz would cost or the age of Albert Pujols, unless he hangs it up. The main candidates on the Mets, however, are all under control through 2024, so that is a push.
In the last three years, McNeil has a higher batting average than J.D., .293 to .288, but J.D. leads the other three in every rate stat: OPS, OPS+, OBP, SLG.
Davis is the clear choice for the Mets DH in 2022. Sitting or trading him would be leading to a Justin Turner class blunder – except there was no evidence that Turner would become a bona fide star. It is all there with JD Davis.
