They’re not pretty, the numbers on Yoenis Cespedes in this young season: In four games, the erstwhile superstar has struck out in half his 14 at-bats and managed just two hits.
Save for that one electric moment when he blasted the game-winning home run on Opening Day -- no small matter, of course -- Cespedes has not looked ready for major league fastballs.
It might be tempting to call for the Mets to use Dom Smith in that DH spot more often, at least against righthanded pitching. Or start Pete Alonso at DH, and Smith at first. Or move J.D. Davis to DH and Smith to left. Or shift Wilson Ramos to DH in order to utilize the defensively superior Tomas Nido or Rene Rivera at catcher.
But it’s not time for any of that yet. The Mets need to find out if Cespedes can still play, and they’re not going to achieve that by giving him fewer at-bats. It’s tough to watch Smith sit, but it’s too early for the team to minimize a potential impact bat in Cespedes.
The problem, in the view of evaluators who have been watching, is timing. He’s not catching up to fastballs. You could see an example in in the fifth inning of Tuesday night’s 8-3 Mets win in Boston, when Red Sox righty Austin Brice beat Cespedes on a 94-mph four-seam for a swinging strikeout.
After the game, manager Luis Rojas echoed the scouting report we heard elsewhere.
“He’s gotten beat by a couple of fastballs up here,” Rojas said, holding his hand to his face. But he also said that Cespedes was “close” to finding his timing, and said he took a few good swings, like the one that produced a ninth-inning double play and was hit to third baseman Rafael Devers.
With Smith looking so good -- he seemed to homer every five minutes in intrasquad games this month, and did the same at Fenway on Monday -- every game that doesn’t include him feels like a waste of his talent. Given that, it’s fair to wonder how long Cespedes should be allowed to search for his old self, after two years away from the game.
The pre-Opening Day hype around him always seemed borderline absurd. What hitter can miss that much time, at that age no less, and rake like he was never gone? This has always been a shakier proposition than some Mets fans wanted to believe.
His limitations on the bases are hardly ideal, either. He’s not supposed to run at 100 percent or run on contact. The latter rule nearly cost the Mets in the third inning Tuesday, when Cespedes remained on third base after Wilson Ramos grounded to Devers. It might have been nice to make Devers throw home (Cespedes later scored anyway on Amed Rosario’s single).
In a pair of exhibition games against the Yankees the weekend before Opening Day, Cespedes began to feel more comfortable at the plate. Then in the opener he reminded us that his bat can be both dynamic and dramatic, choosing the biggest moments to put on a show.
But in three games since, Cespedes has looked pretty much like a 34-year-old who last played in 2018 probably should look: Behind.
That’s not to say he’s a lost cause. That’s actually our point here. The Mets have to keep playing him in order to find out. If Cespedes’ timing clicks, he can transform an offense. It won’t click if he’s on the bench.
If that doesn’t happen in another -- what, week or two? -- we should start talking about Dom Smith again. But not yet.