The New York Mets Should Regress Back To The Mean In 2016
Although the New York Mets are perceived as the favorites to win the NL East in 2016, there is a realistic possibility that they take a big step back. During the past two off-seasons, the Mets have failed to really address their biggest weakness, which is their infield defense. The biggest concern with their infield defense is that most of the Mets infielders have not been able to field batted balls before it gets past them on a consistent basis. The action of fielding batted balls before they get behind the defense can be quantified by looking at an advanced statistic called range runs. According to sporting charts, range runs can be described as "a metric that determines how effective a fielder is (outfield or infield) at cutting off batted balls (fielding batted balls before they get behind the defense) hit to various areas of the field. The resulting value is an indication of how many runs a certain fielder has gained or lost for his team compared to what an average" fielder would do on plays in the same area of the field". Coming into the season all of the starting infielders are below average when it comes to this statistic, for example, last season Asdrúbal Cabrera lost 4.2 runs for the Tampa Bay Rays pitching staff. This is because he has lost a significant amount of his range; in fact, he dove for balls that were 3-4 steps away from him even when they were traveling at average speed. Furthermore, in order to make up for the significant loss in range, he tries to put himself in a spot where he thinks the opposing hitter is going to hit the ball. For instance, against a right-handed hitter, he tends to stand one or two steps away from the hole between Shortstop and Third base because right-handed hitters have a tendency to pull the ball towards that hole. However due to him trying to put himself in a spot where he thinks the opposing hitter is going to hit the ball he is not able to get to the ball that is hit straight up the middle.
As a result of the Mets organization refusing to really address the infield defense, it has put extra pressure on the starting rotation to make the perfect pitch every time. This is because the starting rotation knows that even if they get the opposing hitters to hit a ground ball that there is a chance that the infielder may not get to the ball due to lack of range. As a result, the starting rotation will focus on trying to constantly put the ball in a location where it will be called a strike but the hitter can't get it. As a result, pitchers may start to aim the ball to make sure that the infielder is not given the opportunity to boot a ground ball. But in turn, this may end up hurting the starting rotation in the long run because when pitchers start to aim the ball they usually target the corners of the strike zone. This is because they want to make the hitter believe it is a borderline pitch so that the hitter thinks about not swinging. When a pitcher uses this strategy they run the risk of not being economical with their pitches because depending on the umpire's strike zone the pitchers target may be just outside of the strike zone which will force them to waste extra pitches.
Ultimately because of the below average infield defense, the starting rotation will put extra pressure on themselves to pitch the perfect game almost every time. As a result, the Mets should regress towards wild card contention.
