SNY contributor Joe DeMayo answers fan questions in this edition of the Mets Minor League Mailbag…
ALSO: This week’s episode of The Mets Pod with Connor Rogers and Joe DeMayo will be live at 6 pm Tuesday from the Cadillac Club at Citi Field ahead of the Mets facing the Brewers.
Why do the Mets refuse to bring up Ronny Mauricio? — @F_Piombo
Right to the point, I like it. A simple question that does not necessarily have the simplest answer. As of Monday morning, Mauricio is hitting .311 with 11 home runs and a .874 OPS for Triple-A Syracuse with some signs that his bat is nearing big-league ready.
Offense isn’t really the concern, though. They are right now trying to find a position for Mauricio to play. Second base did not go particularly well as he looked uncomfortable at times and committed seven errors in just 39 games. Recently he has been given a look at left field and it is a bit of a learning curve, as he has only seven games of outfield play as a professional. With that said, long term I think Mauricio is an outfielder, and that’s his most likely path here.
At the moment, Tommy Pham has an OPS of .929 over the last 28 days and even Mark Canha has a more than respectable .860 OPS over that same stretch. The bigger issue with the Mets is clearly the back-end of the starting rotation and the bullpen.
I do think Mauricio’s time is coming, but a little more experience in the outfield in Triple-A would do him well. Also, if the Mets’ play in June carries over into July, they will have to be considering selling some pieces around the deadline, and it may include the previously mentioned Pham and/or Canha. That could be the time for Mauricio to get his opportunity.
When is a realistic ETA for the prospects acquired in the Eduardo Escobar trade? — @metsfan126
The Mets surprisingly sent Escobar to the Angels at the end of last week for two Double-A pitchers in right-handers Coleman Crow and Landon Marceaux. The surprise was not that they moved Escobar or that the Angels wanted Escobar given their injuries at the position, but that he dropped in late June out of nowhere.
The trade itself isn’t necessarily indicative of the Mets’ plans to sell further, but that will be determined by the players on the field over the next two weeks. If we get to the All-Star Break and things are not trending upwards, I would imagine the Mets would then begin to take calls to move some of their veteran players.
Anyway, back to the trade. Both pitchers are at the Double-A level, which should give a reasonable expectation that they could be big league ready sometime in 2024. Crow, however, is dealing with an injury of his own as he has been on the IL since late April with elbow inflammation.
Crow is the higher regarded of the two, as he was ranked No. 8 in the Angels system by Fangraphs before the trade, and MLB Pipeline inserted him into the No. 11 spot in the Mets Top 30 list afterwards. He projects as a back-end type of starter.
Marceaux ranked 25th on Fangraphs pre-trade and is No. 18 on MLB Pipeline’s Mets Top 30 after the trade. Marceaux projects more as a reliever capable of going multiple innings who relies on command and pitchability from his four-pitch mix.
The Mets’ willingness to pay down Escobar’s salary led to them adding two potential top 20 prospects in their system for a player they rarely played. Crow and Marceaux being upper-level pitching, which the Mets are a little low on, is a plus. I thought this was a well-executed trade by GM Billy Eppler.
I understand the thought process of drafting the best player available but with the lack of front-end pitching prospects wouldn’t it make sense to draft the best pitcher available? — @madteam24
I am going to assume this is directed at the Mets’ first pick, specifically at No. 32 overall. While I certainly understand the state of the organization’s pitching depth, the job of the scouting department is to identify the best prospects they can draft and put them in the system and let player development take it from there.
With that said, if you tell me I have two very similarly graded prospects and one is a pitcher and one is a hitter, I might lean pitcher if I were the Mets. Could you see a high school arm like Thomas White from Massachusetts or Charlee Soto from Florida available at 32? That is possible, as high school arms tend to be the profile that slides further in the MLB Draft. However, the last time the Mets used their first draft pick on a high school arm was Steven Matz in 2009, but their first pick wasn’t until No. 72 overall that year. Speaking of high school pitching from Long Island, ESPN linked the Mets to Patchogue-Medford High School right-hander Josh Knoth in their latest mock draft, who is an exciting local kid with a fastball up to 98 mph and a plus breaking ball that will register spin rates of 3,000 rpm or better.
There is some good college pitching depth in the class, but I think a lot will go before the Mets pick at 32, and the next group feels as if they may be a little bit of a stretch at the spot. Could they consider someone like Tanner Witt from Texas, who came back from Tommy John this spring? Maybe a reunion with last year’s unsigned third-round pick, Brandon Sproat? Those feel like good names to know.
I think ultimately the most likely situation is the best available player could be a position player. This class is deep in both college and high school bats. There is a lot of interchangeability based on team preference on these bats in the 23-40 range.
Whether the Mets use their first pick on a pitcher or not will obviously be dependent on their draft board, but in the 20-round draft you should expect the Mets to spend a higher percentage of those selections on pitching.