Despite struggles at the plate, Francisco Alvarez keeps his place in the Mets’ lineup for Game 4 of the NLCS and the trust of manager Carlos Mendoza as the catcher looks to fix the timing issue that appears to be at the root of his hitting woes.
“I feel very late with the fastball, I try to get early to the fastball,” the catcher said before Thursday’s game against the Los Angeles Dodgers. “I think that was the problem. I can’t get early to the fastball [and] I have to be early with the fastball so I can look better at the plate.”
With that as the diagnosis, the prescription is for him to be early with his front foot and be shorter to the ball.
“If I can be shorter to the ball, I can be way better,” he said.
Alvarez has just five hits (all singles) in his first 36 postseason at-bats (.139) with 14 strikeouts and one walk, and he looked particularly lost at the plate on Wednesday night when he struck out looking three times.
Despite those struggles, Mendoza has kept the 22-year-old in the lineup.
“He’s a good hitter, man,” the skipper said after the defeat in Game 3. “He’s a good player. We’re facing an elite pitching staff as well. He’ll come through for us.”
That boost from the first-year skipper goes a long way.
“I really appreciate Carlos to say that and give me that confidence,” Alvarez said. “That is why we are here in the playoffs: He gives confidence to every player… that’s why we’re winning so many games.”
After the game, Mendoza told reporters definitively that “Alvyy is playing” in Game 4. Of course, the manager had already told the catcher that earlier.
“When we were hitting in the eighth, he called me and… he tells me, ‘Hey just be early for the fastball, be ready for the fastball, and that’s it don’t worry about it, you got that and you’re going to play tomorrow, don’t worry,’” Alvarez said.
While that moment did a lot to boost his confidence, Alvarez said he was more worried about not playing well than losing his place in the lineup.
“If he [doesn’t] want me to play today, I can understand that because I’m not doing good yesterday and the past three or four days,” he said. “But he gave me the confidence and today is another day. I can have a different result and I can flip everything today.”
Ahead of Game 4, the skipper said Alvarez “just has to relax here a little bit” because the potential is there offensively.
“This is a guy that can change the outcome of a game with one swing, couple of guys on, because of the power,” Mendoza said.
On top of that, the duty of leading the pitching staff – the main reason Alvarez keeps his spot – is another aspect.
“He’s got a lot on his plate, especially when it comes down to preparing and game planning for a game,” Mendoza said. “Nowadays there’s so much information, and he has to lead a pitching staff. And then on top of that, he’s got to be a hitter as well. But he’s one swing away.”
During his slump earlier in the summer, hitting coach Jeremy Barnes said at the time Alvarez had to make an adjustment with his hips.
“I think as a hitter when we have one problem it’s always kinda the same problem,” Alvarez said. “My hips are very fast, and I open my hips always very fast, so I have to stay closed and now I’m not on time for the fastball and I feel rushed and I’m using my hips so fast. So I just have to slow down my hips, slow down my body and I can do better.”
In the past, Alvarez has said he has struggled with pressing at the plate, but he said the issue is more timing than the mental side of hitting.
“Sometimes, maybe I try to do too much, but, like I said before, I can’t get to the fastballs, and I feel like I’m rushing that’s why it looks like I want to do more than, I can do,” he said. “The bigger thing is I have to be on time with the fastball and that’s it.”
His approach now? “Hit the ball on the barrel, that’s it, it’s my thing and I try to be simple in those moments.”
Despite what must feel like added pressure at this stage of the postseason, the young catcher is focusing on trying to keep the same routine as the regular season.
“I really think it’s the same game, we have to do the same thing we do in the season, nothing changes,” he said. “It’s the same resolve: we want to win, we want to in. So, nothing changes.”
He added later: “I don’t think it’s more pressure, I think it’s the same game.”
Alvarez has continued working through the issues with the Mets’ hitting coaches and Carlos Beltran, as he did during a previous slump and getting feedback from everyone in the clubhouse.
“I keep doing what I was doing in the season,” he said, “I’m listening to everybody. My teammates, they’re telling me ‘slow down, be short to the ball, be more simple.’”
Alvarez said the Mets have a good group, highlighting Francisco Lindor, Jesse Winker and Starling Marte speaking with him amid his struggles.
“Marte don’t talk too much and yesterday he comes to me and I was like, ‘wow, he really love me,’” Alvarez said. “I feel like he talked to me from his heart and I really appreciate him and all my teammates and coaches, too.”
And what did the suddenly talkative Marte have to say?
“He told me, ‘Hey, be happy. Play your game. Don’t try to do too much,” Alvarez said.
But for the youngster, the words mattered less than the action.
“The real thing from Marte is he don’t talk too much, and I feel like he talked to me from the heart,” he said, tapping his own heart. “And I appreciate him doing that.
“He never talked to me like that, he never says something about that. And yesterday he walked up to me and I really like what he said.”
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