Cespedes has a 178 wRC+ which ranks No. 1 in MLB
When Yoenis Cespedes re-signed with the New York Mets this off-season, fans were elated. Even if it’s just for one season, (Cespedes has the opt-out after 2016) the Mets finally have a legitimate power bat to hit in the middle of the lineup, something the Mets have lacked since the days of Carlos Beltran and Carlos Delgado.
What a difference it makes for their lineup to have that dynamic power and run-producing threat, day in and day out. The easiest job Manager Terry Collins has when constructing his lineup is penciling in Cespedes’ name in the cleanup or number three spot. After Sunday’s win and sweep against the Milwaukee Brewers, Yoenis Cespedes is ranking in the top three of many major offensive categories across Major League Baseball.
As of this writing on Sunday night, Cespedes is tied for the Major League lead in home runs (14), 2nd in runs batted in (35), 2nd in slugging percentage (.660), and 2nd in OPS (1.041).
When Cespedes, 30, came over to the Mets last season in the trade with the Detroit Tigers, he provided instant power and a reason to stay glued to your seats for each of his at-bats. While critics will argue that he feasts on inferior pitching and is a free swinger at the plate, 2016 has provided the chance for Cespedes to prove those critics wrong.
And so far through the first 43 games of the year, he has done so on a near regular basis.
First look at the home runs he’s hit. When I started researching the times Cespedes has homered, I noticed that he’s hit a fair amount of clutch home runs to date. And when I mention clutch, I’m speaking of times where his home runs have either put the Mets ahead or tied the game for them. Of the 14 home runs he’s blasted, four of them have tied the game, one has cut the deficit to one run, and two have put the Mets ahead. Six of the home runs have come at Citi Field, proving no ballpark is too big to contain the power of “La Potencia”.
And the part about him hitting only bad pitching? Well this year Cespedes has hit several home runs against some good competition to date. Cespedes’ first and fifth home runs of the year came off of Phillies’ RHP Jeremy Hellickson, whose pitched to a 4-2 record, with a 3.99 earned run average and a 103 in E.R.A. plus. Cespedes has also taken Philadelphia Phillies’ future ace Vince Velasquez deep on April 19th, who is currently top 15 in the Majors in earned run average (2.42), WHIP (0.99), and strikeouts (59).
Cespedes took RHP James Shields and Andrew Cashner deep in the San Diego Padres series back in early May, and also LHP reliever Brad Hand, who’s sporting a 2.82 earned run average and has 28 strikeouts in 22.1 innings pitched as of Sunday. And in the Rockies’ series, he hit a solo shot off of RHP Tyler Chatwood in the top of the third to give the Mets an early 1-0 lead. Chatwood on the year, is 5-3 with a 3.02 earned run average for the surprising second-place Rockies. He also took perennial Mets killer Gio Gonzalez deep against the Nationals on May 18th, hitting a solo shot on a 3-1 count that tied the game for the Mets in the bottom of the fourth. After the Nationals won that game last Wednesday night, Gonzalez is now 7-1 in 12 Citi Field starts, in which he’s put up an earned run average of 1.53.
And how about this for clutch, with 2-outs and runners in scoring position, Cespedes on the year is posting an OPS of 1.083, with 2 home runs, 2 doubles, and 7 runs batted in.
Cespedes has also seen a dramatic spike in walks this year, already with 17 on the season. Combining the Tigers and Mets stats from last season, Cespedes drew a total of 33 walks, good for a walk rate of 4.9%. So far this year, Cespedes has a walk rate of over 10%, more than doubling last year’s numbers.
What’s impressive is that Cespedes, throughout his entire career, has been a free-swinger, and after a rookie year which he walked 8% of the time, was trending down each season thereafter in that category. For him to be able to shrink the strike zone at this stage of his career says a lot about the time and effort he puts in the cage to get better at his craft.
Taking a look at Fangraphs, their O-Swing%, or the percentage of pitches a batter swings at outside the strike zone, indicates that Cespedes is laying off the outside pitch more than he’s done since his rookie season in 2012. He’s currently under 36%, an improvement on his 2014 season (37.2%) and 2015 season (37.5%).
Andrew Beaton of The Wall Street Journal had a great stat on Cespedes and his power and walk rate. He said between 2012 and 2015, 34 players hit at least 90 home runs, and only one player (Adam Jones) has walked less than Cespedes among that group.
Cespedes’ patience at the plate has paid off to a .381 OBP, which is higher than players that normally get on base at a high clip such as Joe Mauer, Jose Bautista, Eric Hosmer, Adrian Gonzalez, and Joey Votto.
If Cespedes can keep up his gaudy stat line, he’ll be in line to be a strong candidate for National League M.V.P. this year. But more importantly, his power and patience at the plate have taken tremendous strides thus far, something that was at a loss in last year’s postseason. Combining all three rounds last year, Cespedes hit .222/.232/.352 with two home runs, both coming in the NLDS, with 17 strikeouts compared to one walk.
If Cespedes can become the force that he’s been for the Mets in the regular season into the playoffs, they’ll have a weapon that can neutralize any pitching at any given moment. Inserting that type of force into a lineup would make any manager smile ear-to-ear, but Collins is hoping that both he and Cespedes will be smiling at the end of this year’s World Series.
