How Mets believe they’ve unlocked Francisco Alvarez’s defensive potential: ‘Changed the game for him’

In a season in which the Mets’ playoff hopes were dashed by June, nearly all of their mid- and late-season victories were going to be of the quieter variety. When the games hardly mattered, steps from the likes of Zac Thornton and Jared Young and Nate Lavender were going to grow in importance. 

Here is another to add to the smaller but meaningful developments of the club’s garbage time: The club believes it has unlocked Francisco Alvarez defensively to pair with Luis Torrens, who already was among the sharpest in the game. 

“This could be the best tandem in Major League Baseball,” catching coach J.P. Arencibia said before Tuesday’s game at Citi Field against the Orioles. “You could argue it already is. That’s what I think is the best: You want to win and you want to dominate your position.” 

Metrically, the Mets have dominated the catching position since Alvarez returned from his meniscus tear on June 9. Before that date, Mets catchers ranked 12th in Catcher Framing Runs, a publicly available advanced metric that estimates how many runs a catcher’s pitch framing saves or costs. 

After that date — when Alvarez returned with good health and with subtle adjustments designed to improve his framing — the Mets entered play Tuesday ranked third, behind just the Blue Jays and Yankees. 

By Fielding Run Value, a more encompassing measure, Mets catchers have gone from sixth pre-Alvarez return to fourth post-return. Overall this season, their 28 percent caught-stealing rate ranked third in the majors. 

A pretty picture to the general public is even rosier in the Mets’ eyes. 

“Our internal numbers,” Arencibia said, “we’re second in throwing in Major League Baseball. We’re third in framing. We’re third in run value — overall defense. 

“And then the second half, which is what I’m most proud of these guys, as of right now we’re 0.2 Run Value away from the Yankees as the top spot in the second half. And to me the Yankees, they’ve been the absolute top of the class for catching, and my goal this year was to catch them.” 

In closing the gap, the Mets partially credit Torrens — who Arencibia believes should receive Gold Glove consideration — and credit tweaks that Alvarez worked on after he suffered his knee injury in May. 

On the other side of surgery, Alvarez is more upright in his squat. A big part of the goal in adjusting the stance was to cut down on the amount his head moved as his left hand whizzed to catch and present the pitch. 

“When his posture was bent, his head moved a lot,” said Arencibia, a first-year major league coach who had worked with Alvarez in Triple-A last season. “There was a lot of movement at the catch, and you want to try to stay as still as possible. The best receivers are very stable, and it’s a lot of just hand movement. 

“Alvy has some of the quickest hands in baseball. And so once we were able to get to a good posture where his head wouldn’t move, essentially all the leverage was going onto the glove — into the movement of the glove — and so that’s really what’s changed the game for him.” 

To get the most out of Alvarez defensively, the Mets altered his pregame routine and now have the still-young catcher catching curveballs, rather than the more traditional fastballs, ahead of games. Doing so makes Alvarez wait further on the pitch, which slows down his motions, Arencibia said. 

It has helped a 24-year-old who burst through the team’s system as a bat-first megaprospect into a catcher rating above average in caught-stealing, framing and pop time, but still below average in blocking pitches. 

And it is at least possible that so much work on defense — which takes precedence for the most important defensive position in the game — has taken away from Alvarez’s bat. 

“I don’t think so,” Alvarez said in disputing the theory. “I think [my] offense is some good, some bad. 

“It’s more like this,” he added, gesturing his right hand in a roller-coaster motion. 

He is right: One of the streakier hitters in baseball hinted at his enormous potential in June and July, when he smacked eight home runs in 38 games with an .833 OPS. 

But from Aug. 1 through Monday, Alvarez was hitting just .176 with a .561 OPS and hearing significant boos in Queens from crowds that have long heard about his power and are not concerned about his posture changes behind the plate. 

“I think like anybody else, when you start pressing and chasing hits, it becomes a much harder game than it is,” interim manager Andy Green said. “He’s gotta just trust himself and turn himself loose. He’s incredibly talented as a hitter when he does that. 

“… From a catching perspective, there’s not a lot of catchers who can do what he can with a bat in his hand.”