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Mets Season in Review: Juan Lagares

Updated Mar. 4, 2020 7:25 p.m. ET

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Fansided, Emmanuel Pepis/FanSided via Rising Apple

Mets outfielder and former Gold Glove winner suffered through injury plagued 2016.

Since Juan Lagares was signed to a contract extension after his 2014 campaign, it’s been a rough go over the last two seasons. The former Gold Glove winner and current Mets outfielder went through an injury plagued year last season.

That came on the heels of a dip in offensive production in 2015. Yet Lagares can certainly still recapture what netted him a deal worth $23 million guaranteed. At least defensively, Lagares remains a huge asset to this club. While his offensive numbers have been down of late, there are hints in his approach that if he sticks with, will result in a return to closer to his ’14 numbers.

A concern going forward is if the injury bug is starting to bite Lagares harder. He did suffer a shoulder injury while playing winter ball. It’s a sigh of relief that he is expected to be ready for spring training, but Lagares is coming off a season in which he suited up in just 79 games. There is now a little more concern about Lagares’ ability to stay healthy.

With all that said, let’s review the shortened season for Lagares and what to look forward to in 2017.

How he fared in 2016

Lagares’ season got off to a fair start in the contact department. Through 18 games played in April, he hit .281. However, he had fewer at-bats because only six of those games were starts. Plus, there were fewer RBI opportunities because he was mostly parked at the bottom of the order.

Lest we forget though, Lagares was hitting well at the time he originally suffered the thumb injury that plagued him for the rest of the season. As of June 14, Lagares had a slash line of .289/.326/.433. Then the bottom fell out in July when he endured a 5-for-50 slump at the plate, dipping his average by over 40 points.

Plus, pre-injury Lagares was still more than getting the job done defensively. It was a tricky injury for him to deal with the rest of the season, and had a huge bearing at the plate. Lagares wound up hitting just .239 for the year with nine RBI in 142 at-bats.

Meanwhile, Lagares had eight defensive runs saved, a category he led the Majors in during his Gold Glove season. Of course, 2016 was a much smaller sample size with just 68 games played in center during the year.

Areas for improvement

Where Lagares can improve is seeking more pitches early in counts to attack. For his career, Lagares is a .324 hitter when the count is either 0-0, 0-1, 1-0, or 1-1. That includes a .317 clip on the first pitch of an at-bat. By contrast, Lagares is a .222 hitter in all other counts.

In fact if you take even more data, Lagares is just 5-for-29 career on 2-0 counts. When he’s gotten to 3-0, Lagares almost always works a walk (only one career at-bat with a 3-0 count). Deep into counts (2-2 and 3-2 combined), Lagares is just a .240 hitter.

Of course, that approach could put Lagares on base more often which means more opportunities to steal bases. Lagares isn’t a premium base stealer by any means, but he’s normally pretty efficient in that category. In his best season at the plate which was 2014, Lagares was 13-for-17 in steals-to-attempts.

For his career, Lagares has 30 steals in 42 tries. This is all while hitting .259 for his career. The one season he spiked above those numbers, we saw a career high in stolen bases. That’s something the Mets could use more of from Lagares since there isn’t much other speed on the roster.

Role for 2017

Getting into Lagares’ role is interesting. We’ll see Curtis Granderson play some games in center, but Lagares is a Gold Glove caliber player and should get more starts out in center. The other factor in this equation though is the development of Michael Conforto. If he finds his way into the lineup, that could push Lagares to the bench more often in favor of the much bigger power threat in Granderson.

As far as the batting order, the Mets only turned in one lineup against an NL team where a position player hit ninth. That’s something Terry Collins has the option of turning to more often with a healthy Lagares in the fold.

Lagares has shown in his career that he can thrive in that lower pressure role in the order when you have Jose Reyes in as your lead-off hitter. Lagares can also lead off in games that he starts where Reyes is on the bench. There’s a little flexibility as far as batting position that the Mets can tap into. Plus, Lagares should see a sizeable number of games played just for his defensive prowess.

Contract status and trade rumors

The Mets are tied to Lagares through 2019. Plus, there’s a club option at $9.5 million for 2020. The remainder of this deal will play out through the rest of Lagares’ 20s (he turns 28 on March 17th). For a plus defender and a guy capable of hitting somewhere in the .280’s, $4.5 million this year is solid value. Of course that number is going to rise the next two years.

However, if Lagares can stay healthy going forward then you know what you’re going to get: above average to elite defense, a hitter somewhere near the upper .200s, and someone who has great range in center and good efficiency as a base stealer when called upon.

It was a frustrating year for Lagares driven mostly by injury, but better days should be ahead in 2017 and beyond if he can stay on the field. I would venture to guess that if Lagares does that, then he’ll have some more Gold Gloves to add to his collection.

As we wind down our player reviews, we hope you have enjoyed reading them. I wish you all a safe and happy New Year!

Juan Lagares gif time!

Next: Mets Season in Review: Brandon Nimmo

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