Mets' Carlos Mendoza puts Brett Baty at third, makes Mark Vientos the DH to begin series in Boston
Brett Baty of the Mets celebrates his eighth-inning two-run home run against the Chicago Cubs with teammate Mark Vientos at Citi Field on May 10. Credit: Jim McIsaac
BOSTON — As circumstances would have it, Brett Baty and Mark Vientos usually have found themselves at odds — not personally, mind you, but professionally.
It happened by virtue of their similar fielding positions, development stages and the limited opportunities afforded any young athlete trying to establish himself as an everyday player on a team built to win now. More chances for one generally meant fewer for the other, and though Baty has been on the losing side of things a lot, it hasn’t looked quite so clear cut since he was called up for an injured Jesse Winker on May 5. Since then, Baty has slashed .269/.731/1.000 with four homers and seven RBIs over 10 games (entering Monday).
Meaning that, for now, adaptation is the name of the game.
On Monday night against the Red Sox, it meant that Baty, who had previously been tasked with learning second base and the outfield, was back at his natural third-base position and batting sixth, where he's defensively superior to Vientos.
Vientos, who has played 38 games at third this year, was instead slotted into the DH role for the seventh time this season, and batted fifth. The mixing and matching can be a lot for young players, but though it’s mostly borne of necessity, shifting to different roles could actually be beneficial, manager Carlos Mendoza said.
“We’ve seen the athleticism from him,” Mendoza said of Baty after he made two sterling defensive plays at third against the Yankees this past weekend. “I think the fact that he’s getting reps in the middle of the infield allows him to be better with his footwork, his read off the bat, his first step, the quickness of it. It’s good to see Baty contribute in a lot of different ways.”
Meanwhile Vientos, who historically has hit better while also playing in the field, has done better in his limited DH chances this season. A career .214 batter as a DH, Vientos entered Monday 5-for-16 (.312) this year.
“There are always challenges [when it comes to DHing]," Mendoza said Monday. “I think he just has to continue to work and the days where he’s not playing third base, DH-wise, he’s got to continue to do his pregame routine and stay ready but I think he’s been handling it just fine…The one thing is that he’s in the lineup, he’s getting at-bats and he’ll learn, he’ll adjust and he’ll continue to get opportunities as third base, too.”
Mendoza also believes Vientos’ current power outage is short lived (he entered Monday with just five homers in 43 games after hitting 27 in 111 games last year).
“He’s hitting some line drives but the power numbers obviously, him driving the ball out of the ballpark like we saw it last year [isn't happening at the same rate], and every player will go through stretches like this,” Mendoza said. “Once they hit one, they’re going to come in bunches.”
For his part, Baty doesn’t mind switching it up at all. He’s played every position there is to play at some point in his baseball life, and actually relishes the idea of moving around from time to time.
While the positional changes haven’t really altered the way he approaches playing third, “I think maybe it’s helped me positively, just seeing the ball from a different view,” he said. “I just have fun bouncing around to different positions… It’s kind of fun the night before knowing, oh hey, I’m going to play a different position tomorrow.”
And though Baty generally hasn’t made it look that hard, “I wouldn’t say it’s easy,” he said. “It’s a challenge and I like to accomplish those challenges… whatever gets me on the field, whatever gets me in the lineup, then I want to play it.”
Notes & quotes: Double-A Binghamton outfielder Nick Morabito was named Eastern League player of the week after going 12-for-26 with six runs, four doubles, a home run, three RBIs and three walks. Fellow Rumble Pony Jonah Tong earned Eastern League pitcher of the week honors for the second week running after allowing two hits in six scoreless innings, striking out eight and walking two against Hartford last week.
Laura Albanese is the Mets beat writer for Newsday. She's been covering MLB since 2014 after starting at Newsday as an intern seven years earlier.
