Since signing with the New York Mets as a 16-year-old kid from Venezuela, Wilmer Flores has given this franchise and its fan base multiple reasons to love him, even if it’s not always performance-based. He’s a likable kid.
From the regime that drafted him (led by Omar Minaya) to the one that has continued to show faith in him throughout his five-year MLB career, he still does everything that’s asked of him and then some.
Since making his debut in 2013, the now-26-year-old has a .260/.298/.426 slash line over 1,480 at-bats. Not once in his career has Flores got over 500 at-bats in a season. The closest he came was 483 in 2015.
When Wilmer’s been given the opportunity to play on a consistent basis, at least over the past three seasons, he’s been very productive at the plate. He absolutely kills left-handed pitching.
In 394 at-bats against left-handed pitchers over the course of his career, Flores has 25 home runs and a slash line of .274/.318/.520.
Even as the right-handed hitting counterpart of a platoon at first base, he figures to carve out a niche as a super-utility, pinch-hitting, lefty-mashing fan favorite for the 2018 edition of the New York Metropolitans.
Flores has shown steady improvement over the last three years. Even though his plate appearances have only been around 300 per season since his high-water mark in games played in 2015 (335 and 362 in 2016 and 2017 after 510 in 2015), his numbers continue to get better and better.
His 162-game averages on baseball-reference.com are listed as 20 homers, 72 RBI, and 25 doubles with a 97 OPS+. These numbers are a bit skewed, considering his past three seasons have been light-years more productive than his first three in the majors.
In 2014, his first full-ish season on the Mets’ roster, he got 259 at-bats and hit .251 with a .664 OPS. His six home runs and 29 RBI were nothing to get all that excited about, but his 13 doubles in that time certainly gave the team a glimpse of what type of player Flores was could become.
From 2015 through 2017, Wilmer Flores saw his power numbers increase from 16 homers in 483 at-bats, to another 16, but in only 307 at-bats in 2016, to 18 in 336 at-bats in 2017. His OPS saw steady rises each year as well, going from .703 t0 .788 to .795 over the same duration of time. His OPS+ has stayed in the low-100s (111 in 2016, 106 in 2017).
Even his fielding, which he has taken a ton of heat for in the past, isn’t really as bad as was expected and sometimes seems. Flores, according to his UZR, has been an average-fielding first baseman throughout his career. His UZR at third and shortstop, while certainly not pretty, aren’t all that terrible, either.
His career UZR rating at third base is -4.1, which is below-average to say the least. The same goes for his UZR at shortstop. While it’s not as bad as his rating at third, his -0.2 there also puts him well below the MLB average over that time.
At first-base, where Flores is projected to spend the majority of his time in the field this season, the 26-year-old has played capably. His career 1.6 UZR at first is decent. If he qualified, his 0.5 UZR at first base in 2017, would have put him right in the middle of the pack among MLB first basemen last season.
Wilmer Flores may never develop into an All-Star, though it wouldn’t surprise me if he did. If he were to get a full season’s worth of playing time as a fully-developed hitter with the type of power he has, I wouldn’t be shocked to see him break out.
Whether or not he gets that opportunity this year will be determined by how/when/if (in that order) the injury bug strikes this team. But even in the bench role that he’s projected to fill, Flores could end up being a key cog on this year’s team.
