Metropolis can slide some basics to steal records

Back in late June, I wrote about the strange thing about what happened in Flushing. Despite its slow pace, and despite not being great in other areas of Baserunning, the Mets threatened to be the most effective base of stealing the team ever.

Well, exactly seven weeks later, the Mets are still slow. According to Statcast, their average sprint speed is 27 feet per second, which puts them on the five-way road in the slowest team in baseball. And they are still not good at replacing the extra base: Statcast puts them at No. 20, and Baseball prospectus There are them on the 15th. But if you’ve been watching the Mets for the past few months, you’re very aware that they can still steal the base.

This week, I looked at the numbers again, as a reader named Kevin raised a question about the tendency to steal new discoveries from Juan Soto. We’ll do SOTO later, but let’s start with the entire team. I wrote this on June 26th. At the time, the Mets had 62 stolen bases, ranking 11th in the Grand Slam, and they were arrested only 10 times. That’s a lot of baseball, so now seems like a good time to give you an update. The Mets have 93 stolen bases, the 11th-largest tooth brushing in the game, and they have only been arrested 10 times. They have not been arrested since June 17! Their last 34 years old is 34 years old!

When I wrote my first work, I focused on the history of success rates. I added incomplete statistics earlier in baseball history, and situations where disengagement rules make theft easier, but it’s still challenging to record. They were at 86.1%, putting them in eighth place, just ahead of the Cubs. Anyway, that was 31 consecutive steals. Let’s go back to that ranking.

The bear has already left its pace. They took 32 more steals, but they were also thrown seven times. The Mets are now alone and if we discount the 2020 A’s, they’ve tried only 29 steals in 60 seasons, these guys have a big lead on the 162-game leader 2023 Mets. I’m sure they’d love to drop these punks once and for all.

What do 2025 Mets need to do in order to get that record? They can stop stealing altogether, but that seems unlikely. After all, they compete in the playoffs and if they have a base that can slide, they will try to participate. In the following table, each row shows the number of times the Mets could be stolen and the number of successful steals needed to maintain the advantage of success rates. They are currently in 126 steals and 14 failed attempts.

The Mets may return and remain ahead of their 2023 version of themselves, but they almost need to maintain this current pace to stand up to 2020 track and field.

The good news is that the Mets have other records to consider. According to Stathead, their current 47-game winning streak without being stolen is the longest fifth in history. The Giants have a current record of 65 games in 2021, although the Mets now have more steals than the Giants have in their entire winning streak (26). In order to tie them up, the Mets will need to avoid being thrown away until September 2. It is possible to compete in another 18 games, but it’s a long time. The historical records of consecutive stolen bases are closer.

It’s hard to study, but to the best of my ability, the Mets tied for the ninth-longest winning streak with the 2024 Cubs (or at least since 1969, when Stathead has full, accurate game-by-play stats). There is another steal, and they will be the same as the 2023 Mets arch buttons. The current record belongs to the 2013 Red Sox, who ended the season with 39 successful steals. If you want to calculate the playoffs, you can credit Boston with a score of 44. If you tend to wrap the 2014 playoffs in the 2014 season, you can credit Sox with 40 awards. Anyway, there are 39 that seem big, which is within reach of the Mets, whose players never seem to score when stealing.

It’s time to go back to Soto and revisit the Mets’ approach. He already has 18 stolen bases, another half of his previous 12 careers. If you look at Sny, you may have noticed that, recently, Ron Darling once said when Soto took second place, Ron Darling said, “I know.”

Dear know Soto is stealing because he is walking the big walking route, which makes it easy for even people as slow as a bag brush. Once he goes that far without any interest from the pitcher, it’s academic. It’s been snatching it for more than five weeks since a catcher even wanted to throw Soto out.

In 2023 and 2024, Statcast’s Soto is worth eight bases less than the average runner, and just started. This year, he has four bases Better Better than average. His grades are still poor in getting the extra foundation. He is slower than ever. He suddenly stole his magicality. In other words, he sounds a lot like the rest of the team. It’s not just Soto’s business. This is a matter of the metropolitan.

Cedric Mullins provides a great example. He is an excellent stationary, brushing at least 30 bags in three different seasons. He traded with the Orioles’ Mets by the deadline, but not many of his 14 steals were like this:

“I don’t know what Mullins is doing, but the two steals he got for the Mets, he got those huge jumps, like the way every Mets does,” Gary Cohen said after the show. In those 18 attempts, Mullins’ average position was 24.3 feet from base when the pitcher released the ball. With the Mets’ average position, it’s 27.9 feet from the base. He has not thrown. When they tried to steal, Mets runners averaged 13.4 feet from base after release. Statcast’s figures date back to 2016, the highest mark any team has proposed in 10 years. When they don’t steal, the average is 11.2 feet, ranking 279th in the 300. This huge difference shows that the Mets know when to go. I won’t let you sit back again, but please know, like I did back in June, I could easily piece together a large stolen super stolen from another metropolis, where the receiver doesn’t bother throwing, the announcer said in front of the court, “What a huge lead.”

When it comes to pitching tendencies, the team is really doing their homework. We don’t know, but I guess it’s an effort, with analysts criticizing the numbers when the pitcher will and don’t throw it away, coaches and video room staff crushing tape to pick up narration and tendencies. The public face of all this preparation is Antoan Richardson, first base coach and race coordinator for running. You may have noticed that the camera found him after Mullins’ recent steal in the clip above.

Again, maybe I was wrong. Maybe it’s not collective effort. When manager Carlos Mendoza was asked a few weeks ago whether stealing more bases a few weeks ago was the focus of the season, “not really.” He continued: “I think it’s just part of the personnel, the situation. Antoan Richardson must be praised in his preparations and then credited to the players. They are buying and executing the game plan. We won’t work harder, the situation will come and we will take advantage of the advantages.”

Whether it all comes down to Richardson or not, he is definitely worth mentioning. This is one of Soto’s recent steals, the guardian of Logan Allen. Allen is left-handed and he is good at running. Statcast ranked him 16th among all pitchers – the 96th percentile – preventing five stolen bases. (However, he ranked only Logan Webb when he was behind Logan Webb, but led Logan Evans, Logan Henderson and Logan Gilbert.

Soto has no huge lead. He is going to take the first step here. Some quick reminders: Allen is hard to steal, Soto as dirt is slow, it is the first inning, the Mets already have the lead, while the second inning stole the second inning, with only 0.1 runs up 0.1 times and winning a 1% victory. Unless you can do it, this is not the case where you really go. Why is Soto sure he can do this? I suspect it was because he was helped. Let’s zoom in on Richardson. Please ignore this fact, we also magnify Allen’s current gigantic ass in the foreground.

Richardson is repeating things until he sees Allen is about to take the first step. After reading a million times and trying to read his lips, my best guess is that he said, “Stay, stay.” That is, once he stops saying “Stay”, Soto should be in second place. It’s just a guess, but whatever he’s saying, it’s obvious that he’s conveying something urgent to the players who are about to steal. Richardson certainly won’t do it every time, but at least on the court, he usually looks like a surgical brain.

These huge walking routes and early rest are dangerous. They make it really easy to get rid of. We usually think of them as a high-risk, high-reward strategy, but the Mets seem to have eliminated all the risks. They don’t steal things often because they’re just stealing things when they’re sure the pitcher won’t quit or throw it over. Maybe all of this preparation had some luck, but now they ranged in three records, and when they were finally caught again, there was speculation.