Jorge Mateo 2024

[Sports Guy]

1 hour ago, Moose Milligan said:

Echoing @Frobby's thoughts, last year MLB Network did that whole thing with DeRosa analyzing his swing, the toe-tap, whatever....everyone thought that the breakout was real. 

Fool me once, shame on me...I'm not getting fooled again though.  It's nice to watch him hit when he's on a heater but there's no doubt in my mind he'll revert back to form at some point in the near future.  

I do love watching him in the field though.  He's picked up second base really quickly and plays very well.

Watching Mateo run is weirdly one of the best things to see. His speed is eye popping. 
 

Mateo has surprised me by seemingly giving his career a boost by showing he can play other positions and play them well.  I was skeptical of how he would do in that super UTI role and while I still am, the skepticism is a lot less. 
 

I am now seeing a player that, even if his OPS ends up closer to 600 than 700, that I feel is more “rosterable” than any other time since he has been here.

Now, whether or not I will feel that way next year when the salary increases remains to be seen but last year, I wanted him cut. This year, I would cut Urias over him now and I have always been a Urias fan and would have cut Mateo in favor of Urias probably as late as a month ago.(I really don’t want to cut him either)

[Camden_yardbird]

14 hours ago, Malike said:

Don't forget to check your AOL email using Netscape browser.

Please go visit my geocities Jorge Mateo fan site for the most up to date information.  It has Hotmail integration so you can get daily updates.

 

Damn, now I kind of want to make a geocities Jorge Mateo fansite. 

[emmett16]

2 hours ago, DrungoHazewood said:

Hint: He's 29 and has a .641 career OPS in over 1200 plate appearances spanning five seasons. Good chance it'll be around .641.

For sure.  I just don’t want to see him completely fall off a cliff like he did last year.  I’m kinda hoping he can be a .690-.700 guy for a year or 2.  I don’t expect it, but keeping my fingers crossed.  

[DrungoHazewood]

9 minutes ago, emmett16 said:

For sure.  I just don’t want to see him completely fall off a cliff like he did last year.  I’m kinda hoping he can be a .690-.700 guy for a year or 2.  I don’t expect it, but keeping my fingers crossed.  

That would be nice. But whenever a player has some success, especially in modern baseball with ubiquitous data, everyone in the league is pouring over all the video and Statcast info to find a weakness, and they'll attack him in different ways. He'll have to adjust to that. In the past that hasn't gone over so well. It's not just a case of Mateo fixing some flaw, it's usually him having to adjust to being pitched differently by doing things differently (and often not so successfully) as well.

Edited May 22 by DrungoHazewood

[interloper]

2 hours ago, DrungoHazewood said:

Hint: He's 29 and has a .641 career OPS in over 1200 plate appearances spanning five seasons. Good chance it'll be around .641.

Tell that to Ryan O'Hearn.  

[DrungoHazewood]

3 minutes ago, interloper said:

Tell that to Ryan O'Hearn.  

Much of O'Hearn's "improvement" is because of the shift ban. O'Hearn's wOBA in non-shift/non-shade configuration from 2021-2024: .432, .350, .358, .529. In 2023-24 his shade (the mild shift that's still legal) wOBA is .329 and .318, while from 2019-2022 when the shift was legal his wOBA into the shift was .278, .267, .243, .249. I think the Statcast data is pretty clear-cut: he was destroyed by the more extreme shifts. Good on the Orioles for identifying that ahead of the shift ban last year.

I don't think anything like this applies to Mateo.

[interloper]

Just now, DrungoHazewood said:

Much of O'Hearn's "improvement" is because of the shift ban. O'Hearn's wOBA in non-shift/non-shade configuration from 2021-2024: .432, .350, .358, .529. In 2023-24 his shade (the mild shift that's still legal) wOBA is .329 and .318, while from 2019-2022 when the shift was legal his wOBA into the shift was .278, .267, .243, .249. I think the Statcast data is pretty clear-cut: he was destroyed by the more extreme shifts. Good on the Orioles for identifying that ahead of the shift ban last year.

I don't think anything like this applies to Mateo.

Stand down soldier! The winky emoji is doing most of the work in my comment. 

[Sports Guy]

Mateo’s OpS is dropping because he’s playing too much.  
 

The Os really want him to be an everyday guy because they love the tools..but he’s not that.

Face mostly lefties, limit the at bats under 300 and he probably can be a productive bench guy.

Play him everyday and he gets exposed. The Os need to play Urias more, especially vs righties, as he is better vs righties than Mateo is.

[emmett16]

34 minutes ago, DrungoHazewood said:

That would be nice. But whenever a player has some success, especially in modern baseball with ubiquitous data, everyone in the league is pouring over all the video and Statcast info to find a weakness, and they'll attack him in different ways. He'll have to adjust to that. In the past that hasn't gone over so well. It's not just a case of Mateo fixing some flaw, it's usually him having to adjust to being pitched differently by doing things differently (and often not so successfully) as well.

Very good point.  

[DrungoHazewood]

47 minutes ago, interloper said:

Stand down soldier! The winky emoji is doing most of the work in my comment. 

Sorry! I just pretty regularly see posts here and (mostly) elsewhere that are of the form "Ryan O'Hearn had a miraculous transformation when he came to the O's. Either they're awesome, or the Royals are idiots, probably both!" But the truth is (mostly) that O'Hearn was wiped out by the shift.

[Malike]

9 minutes ago, DrungoHazewood said:

Sorry! I just pretty regularly see posts here and (mostly) elsewhere that are of the form "Ryan O'Hearn had a miraculous transformation when he came to the O's. Either they're awesome, or the Royals are idiots, probably both!" But the truth is (mostly) that O'Hearn was wiped out by the shift.

Right, O'Hearn has always hit the ball hard. The shift definitely hurt him. His HH % is the lowest of his career this year, but his exit velo and Barrel % are both pretty good in 2024. 

[Pickles]

1 hour ago, Sports Guy said:

Mateo’s OpS is dropping because he’s playing too much.  
 

The Os really want him to be an everyday guy because they love the tools..but he’s not that.

Face mostly lefties, limit the at bats under 300 and he probably can be a productive bench guy.

Play him everyday and he gets exposed. The Os need to play Urias more, especially vs righties, as he is better vs righties than Mateo is.

I honestly don't think the bolded is the case.

The plan was almost certainly for Holliday to be getting the lion's share of 2b ABs.

And for Mateo to be in a role much as you described.

However, performance- both of Holliday and Mateo- have dictated otherwise.  For now.

[Sports Guy]

24 minutes ago, Pickles said:

I honestly don't think the bolded is the case.

The plan was almost certainly for Holliday to be getting the lion's share of 2b ABs.

And for Mateo to be in a role much as you described.

However, performance- both of Holliday and Mateo- have dictated otherwise.  For now.

They still have other alternatives to playing Mateo everyday and the performance hasn’t been great at the plate for a lot of this month.

They talk themselves into him as an everyday guy. 

[interloper]

24 minutes ago, Sports Guy said:

They still have other alternatives to playing Mateo everyday and the performance hasn’t been great at the plate for a lot of this month.

They talk themselves into him as an everyday guy. 

I think it's basically that neither he nor Urias are going to hit much, so you might as well play the guy who makes insane plays at 2B like he did today. 

[Pickles]

11 minutes ago, Sports Guy said:

They still have other alternatives to playing Mateo everyday and the performance hasn’t been great at the plate for a lot of this month.

They talk themselves into him as an everyday guy. 

Well, I think they like him more than Urias and that's basically it.

If he starts to struggle w the bat, and Urias hits some more, then their playing time will be adjusted.