Bench role giving J.D. Davis a helping hand

MIAMI — Recent weeks have featured a major regression in playing time for J.D. Davis, who has returned to a familiar if undesirable role: bench bat.

A confluence of circumstances, including Jonathan Villar’s hot stretch and Davis’ not-so-hot stretch, have led to Davis being in the starting lineup just three times in the past two weeks. Two of those games were on doubleheader days. He was out again Wednesday as the Mets played the Marlins.

Relearning this version of his work-day routine has been a process, said Davis, who in 2019 began his Mets career as a part-time player until hitting well enough to force his way into everyday at-bats.

"It’s fine. It’s definitely different," he said. "I’ve always said from the beginning, I’ll do whatever it takes for the team to win . . . It’s definitely different, but it’s a role that I haven’t been out of the water with. I’ve had it in the past. Just gotta do what you gotta do. Do your homework and contribute when your name is called.

"It takes you a week or two to get back into that routine of getting comfortable coming off the bench, learning — not learning, but reiterating some of the smaller things that you did when you were coming off the bench."

The upside for Davis: Less playing time means more rest time for his hands — yes, hands, plural. His left hand still is bothering him, and in recent weeks so has his right thumb, two reasons he has struggled to perform offensively, he said.

"A little beat up, but they’re all right," he said. "It is what it is. Just kind of working around it."

His left hand issue has been well documented. He missed two and a half months with a torn ligament between his middle and ring finger.

Since returning, he has hit .261 with a .362 OBP and .403 slugging percentage. That is a steep dropoff from his .405/.490/.619 slash line in 15 games before that injury.

That ligament is only 85-90% healed, Davis said. Three doctors have told him it should heal completely over the offseason and he won’t need surgery. But until then it is a pain management issue.

"It doesn’t tickle," he said. "You try to get to a place where it’s tolerable and do your best and work professional at-bats and try to get on base."

When he was trying to return from that injury, eventually doing so in mid-July, he developed a "small dose of tendinitis" in his right thumb. That was the result of working it hard — "kind of overdoing it," he said — after a period of inactivity.

"Basically a little achy," he said. "I was trying to catch up after two months without picking up a bat and not swinging, and then trying to revamp and trying to catch up catch up to a major-league fastball.

"It was barking a little bit. It was aches and pains. So far right now they’ve calmed down a little bit ever since I stopped starting and stopped swinging as much, which has helped out a lot."

At risk of stating the obvious: It is awfully hard for a hitter to hit when his hands hurt.

"You gotta be fair to yourself," Davis said. "You’re going up there not feeling 100%, you try to work the counts or try to work how the pitched it throwing to you."

That has led to a change in goal for his plate appearances, increasingly of the pinch-hit variety.

"Doesn’t necessarily need to be a hit or an out or a home run or a ground ball," he said. "But just something where you get the pitcher to throw three, five, six pitches, just to get rid of some bullets and pass the torch along in that pitcher’s spot. But yeah. Of course it’s harder without your hands."