PORT ST. LUCIE — Jeff McNeil is a rumor.
A Yeti. A UFO. Nessie out in the loch.
The Mets keep hinting at major league spring training action for McNeil, but that was delayed yet again from Sunday to now Tuesday. He has a locker in the Clover Park home clubhouse. But in the windows in which reporters are allowed inside, you might see a back moving from one off-limits area to another. The closest to actually seeing McNeil in the clubhouse is Rylan Bannon, a nonroster who looks a fair amount like McNeil.
But now even Bannon has been reassigned to minor league camp.
Call me overly suspicious, but just to be sure, I checked with Carlos Mendoza, Brandon Nimmo and hitting coach Eric Chavez to make sure McNeil exists and is not Sidd Finch 2.0. Each laughed and assured me that, indeed, McNeil is present and doing everything but playing in major league games as he heals from a torn elbow ligament, though Chavez initially joked, “I am kind of in the same boat. But, really, I actually saw him running earlier.”
It is fine that McNeil is a phantom now, especially because Chavez insists that the lefty swinger only needs “20 at-bats to get ready [for the regular season]. He is a roll-out-of-bed-type of hitter.” But McNeil has to show up for the 2024 Mets.
So much has been made about what a catalyst Starling Marte was for the 100-win 2022 Mets and what his poor performance/injury absence meant to the 75-win club last year. But McNeil’s fall from NL batting champ to toothless at-bat also was central to the plummet.
His 56-point drop from .326 to .270 was the third-largest in the majors among those who took at least 200 plate appearances in 2022 and 2023 — nestled between near-Met Carlos Correa’s 62-point cliff dive and Pete Alonso’s 55.
Chavez, the bench coach last season, said he felt McNeil became trapped between whether to pull for power or slap for average and wound up in the worst of both worlds. McNeil’s 86 mph average exit velocity in 2023 was a career-low — but it isn’t like McNeil hit the ball hard when he batted .319 from 2018-20 or in his strong 2022. McNeil’s gift, which Chavez likened to his successor as NL batting champion, Miami’s Luis Arraez, has been in spraying the ball for success. And, Chavez said, it is important to McNeil and the Mets that version is the player that resurfaces in 2024.
Which brings us back to a due date to begin to see if McNeil has a magical hitting wand again. The Mets announced late last season that McNeil had the elbow tear that would not need surgery. This spring he has been hitting on back fields and going through all the defensive drill work, Mendoza said. And Mendoza explained the decision to back away from an initial plan for McNeil to face the Nationals on Sunday and instead play on the minor league side was about controlling the atmosphere for another day. The plan now, the manager said, is that after an off-day for the entire team Monday, McNeil will play Tuesday against the Cardinals.
And what Mendoza continues to say is that McNeil will be ready for March 28 against the Brewers at Citi Field. And what the Mets continue to espouse is that the roller coaster of .311 in 2020 followed by .251 and then .326 and .270 last year is going to glide into another strong season for McNeil, who turns 32 next month and still has three years at $43.75 million left on his contract.
“He doesn’t need to be 2022 Jeff McNeil,” Nimmo said. “He doesn’t have to win a batting title for us. We just need solid at-bats and him on base a lot because, when that occurs, our offense is so much better.”
McNeil will be mainly entrenched at second base this year rather than taking regular corner-outfield turns. Where he will bat is less settled. Mendoza said he prefers a set lineup but has not yet determined what order he prefers. Buck Showalter appreciated that McNeil had no qualms being bounced all around the lineup, and Chavez said he could see McNeil, if he is again a high-average tough at-bat, being an option to hit behind Alonso — a role the Mets have to this point ignored filling from the outside.
Mendoza said he will split lefty bats to avoid easy lanes for opposing relief decisions. And even here, McNeil’s revival is vital. Nimmo and the switch-hitting Francisco Lindor are the main lefty hitters. Can Brett Baty hold third base to provide another? Will Ji Man Choi or DJ Stewart make the team to provide a lefty DH option?
In 2020 and 2022 when McNeil thrived, he hit .316 and .332, respectively, against righty pitching. In 2021 and 2023 when he didn’t, McNeil hit .251 and .260 versus righties.
To keep lineup balance and length, the Mets can live with his man-of-mystery act in spring training.
But they can’t have him disappear again once the season begins.
