For all their stars, the Mets’ season comes down to these two players
- Covers MLB for ESPN.com
- Former deputy editor of Page 2
- Been with ESPN.com since 1995
For all their star power — Pete Alonso, Francisco Lindor, Max Scherzer and Justin Verlander, for starters — the ultimate success of the 2023 New York Mets is heavily reliant on two less-talked-about players: Jeff McNeil and Brandon Nimmo.
Why is that? Well, in order to understand the makeup of today’s Mets, let’s turn back the clock to 2014, when teams were playing a much different game than they are in 2023.
The San Francisco Giants beat the Kansas City Royals in the World Series that year, hitting 132 home runs to the Royals’ 95, which ranked last in the majors. Turn back a year earlier and the St. Louis Cardinals reached the Fall Classic after ranking 27th in the majors with 125 homers. In 2012, the Giants won the World Series after ranking last in the majors with 103.
As batting averages have declined and strikeouts increased over the past decade, teams have relied more and more on home runs. The average team in 2022 hit 174 home runs. When home runs were more plentiful in 2021, the average team hit 198. Early in 2023, home runs are up slightly from last season, especially when comparing April to April.
It’s not just the total number of home runs that has jumped either: In 2014, just 33.4% of all runs came via the home run. By 2021, that figure had climbed to 42.8% and it was 39.9% the following season. Not surprisingly, outhomering the competition has become a more common formula for winning, too, as five of the past six World Series champions ranked in the top four in the majors in home runs during their title-winning season.
Here’s where we get back to the Mets: They’re trying to win with an offensive style more like what we saw a decade ago than what we see from the offensive powerhouses of today. Even with Alonso slugging 40 home runs in 2022, the Mets were below the major league average with 171 home runs.
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