☀️ GOOD MORNING:
Why is Jared Young playing DH? You might have uttered that question, even if you thought the KBO connection with Brandon Waddell was cute. I definitely got texts about it. Why were the Mets sacrificing opportunities for both young and veteran players in favor of this guy most people hadn’t heard of before last week?
We got a glimpse on Tuesday. For a team that hasn’t been hitting and is facing a right-handed-heavy pitching staff, playing an extra lefty with slug suddenly made sense. And it quickly paid dividends.
David Stearns is a master at understanding the art of incremental value. As much as baseball is a game of sample size, the more teams dive into analytics, neutralizing obvious long-term gains, the difference between making the playoffs, or not, could be decided by the marginal value you extract on a late May night against the White Sox.
👋 HELLO OFFENSE: Young made the most of his newfound opportunity, following a first-inning Pete Alonso two-run blast with a two-run homer of his own. A Mets team that had gone 13 consecutive games without scoring more than five runs, plated four in the first inning, recording six hits (five consecutive) and reaching base seven times in the opening frame, their most in the first inning in three years.
An offensive outburst that still left fans wanting more — the bats went only 1-for-6 with runners in scoring position, leaving eight on base — resulted in a 6–4 final and gave the Mets their fourth straight victory, keeping them within 1.5 games of the Phillies.
☔️ NEW START TIME: With rain in the forecast, the two teams moved Wednesday’s start time from 7:10 PM to 1:10 PM. Anyone who held a ticket before the time change will receive a voucher for a ticket to any remaining 2025 Monday-Thursday regular-season home game.
Griffin Canning (5-1, 2.88 ERA) will face off against the top pick from the 2024 Rule 5 draft and Sox ace Shane Smith (1-3, 2.36 ERA).
☕️ Grab your coffee for your morning dose of Mets Fix!
🤨 WAIT, WHAT HAPPENED?
It feels like we’ve truly seen it all over the first few months of this season, from controversial triple play calls to umpires pulling on arcane rules to both help the Mets (on a weekend interference call against Max Muncy) and hurt the Mets (on how to tag up on a juggled sac fly ball). Well, we got another strange play on Tuesday that turned a Juan Soto hit into an out?
It started with Soto’s drive to right field that looked, from afar, like Michael A. Taylor had caught on a diving play.
Brandon Nimmo, who started at first base, had been running hard on contact and had already rounded second when he thought Taylor had caught the ball, so he turned back. Meanwhile, Soto also pulled up, thinking he had been robbed.
With Soto retreating as if he was out, Nimmo sped past him on his way back to first base to avoid getting doubled up. Because the two runners crossed paths, Soto was ruled out, even though he had technically recorded a hit (more on this in a bit), while Nimmo was allowed to remain at first base.
🤔 What’s the rule? MLB official rule 5.09 (b)(9) states, “Any runner is out when he passes a preceding runner before such runner is out.” That means, Soto, who technically passed Nimmo between first and second, was out, while Nimmo was safe? I guess so!
🗣️ “When Soto hit it, I thought, ‘That's down for sure. It's a double or better,’” Nimmo explained. “I went to go round the bag, I had my back to the play, and then I heard the crowd acting like the ball was caught. And so I turned around and went to get back when I saw [Taylor] on the ground.”
🤨 So Soto didn’t get a hit? He did, but he didn’t. The fact his line drive found the outfield grass instead of Taylor’s glove caused all of the confusion. But, as detailed by MLB, the official ruling on such a play is that Soto is out:
This exact scenario is covered in MLB’s rule interpretations for the official scorer. Under rule 9.05 (b)(1), the scorer is not allowed to credit the batter with a hit unless every runner that is forced to advance actually advances to the next base. The force on Nimmo was reinstated as soon as he retreated back around second base (because he thought he needed to tag up), and he ended up back on first base. It's as if Nimmo never successfully reached second base on the play, and that means Soto, the batter, can't be given a hit, even though he reached first base safely before he was called out.
🌪️ SEARCHING FOR ANSWERS
This wasn't supposed to be how 2025 looked for Francisco Álvarez, the top prospect who found firm footing in the major leagues as quickly as any young catcher we have seen in recent memory.
Álvarez is supposed to be a core piece. A difference maker who can both hit home runs and prevent them by managing a pitching staff at the highest level. He's not supposed to be in a battle with journeyman Luis Torrens for playing time.
How did we get here? What does the future look like for Alvarez?
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