An optimistic analysis of A.J. Ewing

The Giants mashed their way to victory on Saturday evening, but someone else mashed too

What’s Up with the Mets? ⚾️

• The Mets found themselves on the other end of a home run derby, falling to the Giants behind six San Francisco dingers, 9-5 (box)

• LHP Zac Thornton got rocked, allowing six runs on seven hits in his five innings, including four homers; the top of the lineup flopped too, as SS Francisco Lindor, LF Juan Soto, DH Bo Bichette, and RF Carson Benge all went hitless

• 1B Jared Young, meanwhile, continued his recent hot streak with a two-hit, two-run day; CF A.J. Ewing hit his first homer since July 8th, a two-run tank in the second inning

• 3B Brett Baty had a three-RBI day, drawing a bases-loaded walk in the seventh and a two-run double in the bottom of the ninth that nearly left the yard

• C Francisco Álvarez's recent struggles continued, ending his day hitless with three strikeouts

• RHP Chris Devenski gave up a hit and nothing more in his two scoreless innings of relief; LHP Jefry Yan and RHP Justin Hagenman were not as productive, allowing a combined three runs on a homer apiece

• The Mets will recall RHP Jonah Tong to pitch against the Marlins on Monday, Mets manager Andy Green said on Sunday

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Play of the Game ⭐️

Welcome back, kid!

After Marcus Semien reached safely on a fielder’s choice, the long-slumping A.J. Ewing reminded everyone what he can do. On the fourth pitch of the at-bat, Ewing powered a 2-1 changeup out of the bottom of the zone and into the right-center bullpen.

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Who’s Hot? 🥵

• Jared Young is hitting .290 with a .774 OPS in his last 30 games played (107 AB)

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Who’s Cold? 🥶

• C Francisco Álvarez is hitting just .165/.277/.309 with three homers, 10 RBI, and 45 strikeouts over his last 30 games played (97 AB)

• LHP Jefry Yan has allowed at least one run in each of his last four appearances

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The Just Mets Podcast 🎙️

ICYMI: Rich sat down with Marc Luino, aka ‪@GiraffeNeckMarc‬ (co-host of ‪Mets’d Up‬ & ‪The Windup‬) to revisit some preseason predictions, examine some of the season’s most nonsensical narratives, and preview how this team can contend in 2027.

SUBSCRIBE: YouTube | Apple Podcasts | Spotify

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Down on the Farm 🌾

• 2B Émilien Pitre (No. 11 prospect, Triple-A): 2-for-5, HR, 2 RBI

• 1B/3B Nick Lorusso (Triple-A): 2-for-4, R, 2 RBI, BB, K, SB

• 3B Jefferson Rojas (No. 1 prospect, Double-A): 1-for-4, HR, K

• RHP R.J. Gordon (No. 30 prospect, Double-A): 6.0 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 2 BB, 5 K, HR

• DH Corey Collins (Double-A): 1-for-4, 2B, RBI, K

BOX SCORES

Single-A SLU (SSPD) | High-A BRK | Double-A BNG | Triple-A SYR

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Today’s Game 🗓

Match-up: Mets (64-78) vs. Giants (59-84)

Where: Citi Field - Flushing, NY

Starters: RHP Christian Scott (4-4, 3.80 ERA) vs. LHP Cesar Perdomo (0-0, 2.25 ERA)

When: 1:40 PM EDT

Where to Watch: SNY

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Let’s be patient with AJ Ewing ✍️

NY Post

A.J. Ewing hasn’t looked all that good at the plate for quite a while…but how bad has he really been?

Bad. There’s no other way to spin a .174/.258/.243 slash over his last 30 games.

Though Ewing is widely considered the future of the franchise in center field, his performance in the box has been bad enough to warrant questions about just how ready he is to tackle this talent level.

There’s a big difference, though, between being worried about a player’s real-time process and results, and being worried about the player overall. And at this moment, despite any offensive evidence to the contrary, there remain ample reasons for even the most nervous of fans to believe Ewing to remain optimistic.

Here are three big reasons why:

1. His contact data is more reassuring than concerning

Ewing’s .254 BABIP over the last month is obviously concerning, particularly when extending the sample back into July. But the reason for it is probably pretty simple.

Over the past month of slump, Ewing has been hitting the ball at a league-average rate when it comes to harder contact, while continuing to keep truly weak contact to a minimum. His overall hard-contact rate has remained remarkably consistent throughout the season, including during this slump. All of that bodes well for a true contact hitter profile.

Where Ewing gets into trouble, though, is the lack of enough hard contact. His medium-speed contact rate has been among the worst in baseball since the start of August, a death sentence for a considerable chunk of the line-drive contact he creates. Far too often lately, when Ewing puts the ball in play, it’s landing in “likely an out” territory — he’s elevating the ball well, but often not offering enough pop to put it where it’ll play.

That’s not ideal. But it’s fixable.

And while Ewing develops his power tool, his raw hit and speed tools can keep him dangerous as a run scorer in other ways. His spray chart might offer one avenue for doing exactly that.

Ewing’s contact goes pull-side less than 25% of the time — for a hitter who produces plenty of line drives, that means far too much extra-base potential being left unfulfilled. Turning a few more of those medium-power liners into balls pulled down the first base line or into the right field corner would likely make a meaningful difference, and quickly.

2. He hasn’t abandoned his core approach at the plate

This is probably the most reassuring bit of this entire analysis: Ewing has walked in 8.5% of his plate appearances during the last month of his slump; his season rate is 9.0%. That’s a good sign.

Though his strikeout rate has jumped significantly, Ewing hasn’t started chasing at a ridiculous rate as a result of any pressing he may be doing. In fact, Ewing is chasing less during this last month than his season baseline, despite swinging more frequently than his current per-162 pace would suggest. That’s significant.

And beyond his outstanding plate discipline, it’s when you started wading further into the plate approach and contact data weeds that the case supporting some genuinely bad batted-ball luck here starts to hold more water.

Ewing’s overall contact rate during the last month is 77%, almost identical to his 77.2% season rate. His zone-contact rate has dipped from 85.4% for the season to 82.5% during the slump, which is worth acknowledging, but that isn’t exactly the profile of someone who has completely lost the ability to make contact. Case in point: he’s also fouling pitches off at essentially the same rate. Clearly, contact itself hasn’t been the issue.

Taken together, these numbers suggest that Ewing’s core process is still worth building on, rather than indicating that he needs a total teardown. There are certainly things to clean up — the contact he does make needs to become more authoritative, and a small drop in zone contact is something to monitor — but there realistically probably isn’t as much to fix here as a months-long, sub-.200 batting average might suggest.

3. The rest of his game hasn’t gone anywhere

Ewing’s essentially been a guaranteed out in the batter’s box throughout the second half, but it’s critical to remember that a player’s value does not solely exist at the plate; why else would NL ROY candidate JJ Wetherholt’s WAR be almost entirely propped up by his defense?

Despite some lackluster lumber, Ewing’s defense remains excellent. His +3 Fielding Run Value puts him among the top defensive rookies and inside the top 25 center fielders in all of MLB. He’s even better on the basepaths: Ewing’s 22 stolen bases lead all rookies, with Carson Benge’s 20 right behind him.

We’re not talking about someone who looks overmatched in every facet of the game; there’s a solid argument to be made that, despite the surface stats, he isn’t even completely overmatched at the big league level. It’s not like Ewing’s game has eroded to the point where you worry about whether or not he has the stuff to stick around — most metrics suggest quite the opposite.

He’s going to need to adjust to major league velocity in order to bring his strikeout rate back down to earth, and he’ll have to put some power behind the contact he makes while keeping it elevated and bringing it to all fields more frequently…but all of that is fixable. Nothing that was just described is anything more severe than standard rookie development stuff.

4. He just got here!

Folks, he’s only 22. Perhaps panic should be put on pause until, say…his age 25 season. They’ve stayed patient with Brett Baty, Francisco Álvarez, and even Mark Vientos. Why wouldn’t they with Ewing?

Imagn Images

Generally speaking, it takes most hitters several full-workload seasons to establish their particular place in the league. A 2022 Pitcher List study found that Year 3 is, on average, where the biggest statisical leaps tend to take place at the plate. Looking at wRC+ specifically, they found that a player’s rookie season is the least significant year of their first six; they also noted that just as many rookie struggle stories (Nolan Arenado, 77 rookie wRC+; Michael Brantley, 73 rookie wRC+) as cautionary tales (Keston Hiura, 139). With regard to isolated power (ISO) development, there are listed countless examples of career sluggers who started their careers with underwhelming power numbers.

The most damning part of the PL report involves the improvement of rookie strikeout rate, which is to say that, historically, there hasn’t been much en masse: “If you’re banking on a player suddenly going from liability to above-average in terms of contact ability, that is likely a very tall task that will not be met.”

However, Ewing’s current strikeout woes aren’t at all typical for him: he averaged a ~17% rate over his last two minor league seasons, and his season rate sits at 26%, about league average. Coupled with a steady ability to draw walks, there’s plenty of reason to believe Ewing can be a bit of an exception to the rookie rule here.

In summary: the book is far from written on A.J. Ewing. We’re barely out of the introduction. After all, this is a kid who was ranked at the bottom of the org’s farm system as recently as a year ago.

Now, mere months later, he’s a symbol of a franchise’s future being realized arguably too early…but just as likely right on time.

It’s a lot to wear on one’s shoulders — and Ewing’s leading the rookie class in steals while doing it.

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Around the League 🚩

• Zack Wheeler struck out nine Braves en route to a 4-2 Phillies win to reduce Atlanta’s NL East lead to four games

• Munetaka Murakami hit his 30th homer in a 6-4 loss to Minnesota, giving the White Sox their third 30-homer player this season (Miguel Vargas, Colson Montgomery)

• An ailing Shohei Ohtani missed a third consecutive game, with Dave Roberts suggesting an IL stint is under consideration; Tommy Edman’s late three-run homer helped the Dodgers nudge the Nats, 6-5

• Kazuma Okamoto’s four-hit, two-RBI night led the Jays to a 4-3 win over the Royals, pushing Toronto into sole possession of the final AL Wild Card spot

• Riley Greene’s four-hit day and Framber Valdez’s seven scoreless innings paved the path for a 6-0 Detroit win over Cleveland; Greene homered twice off Guardians starter Parker Messick