Statistical Spotlight: Jorge Polanco’s Situational Hitting

Well Mets fans, there has been movement. Not the biggest splash in the world following the recent departures of Pete Alonso and Edwin Díaz in free agency, but still a move nonetheless.

The club signed Jorge Polanco to a two-year, $40 million deal last week. There has been speculation that Polanco will help fill the void left by Alonso at first, although he has only amassed one single game in his 12-year career at the position. He primarily played second base while also serving as the Seattle Mariners’ designated hitter in 2025.

Polanco slashed .265/.326/.495 with an OPS of .821 last season. He also launched 26 home runs with 78 RBIs. While some believe that this was a downgrade to replace Alonso’s bat, there was an interesting take on SNY’s “The Mets Pod” that Polanco’s production will more so replace the void left by Brandon Nimmo, who was traded to the Texas Rangers for Marcus Semien in November.

For reference, Nimmo slashed .262/.324/.436 with an OPS of .760 this past season. He also hit 25 home runs with 92 RBIs. Those numbers are very comparable to what Polanco put up in Seattle. Was this, in fact, Mets president of baseball operations David Stearns’ strategy to replace Nimmo’s bat despite the fact that they play different positions? Could very well be.

What else did Stearns see in Polanco? Well, he put up some really interesting numbers with runners in scoring position, which is the focus of this statistical spotlight.

There was no covering it up: the Mets were pretty bad with runners in scoring position in 2025, particularly in the first half of the campaign and really struggled with their situational hitting. As a whole, the Mets ranked No. 27 in batting average (.230) with RISP up until the All-Star Game.

Polanco on the other hand, excelled in this statistic, evidenced by the fact that he batted .337 with six home runs and 52 RBIs in those situations. Even more impressive, however, is that he hit even better with RISP and two outs! He posted a .400 batting average in those spots with three home runs and 26 RBIs. Is that potentially what piqued Stearns’ interest as he continues shaking up the Mets’ core?

There are many skeptics regarding situational hitting. In “The Book: Playing the Percentages in Baseball,” authors Andrew Dolphin, Mitchel Lichtman and Tom Tangostate stated that the best situational hitting is to be consistently good. This is indeed a factual statement, but it brings up the age-old question: “is there really a clutch gene?”

Hopefully the answer is yes so that Polanco can replicate his situational hitting success for the Mets in 2026.

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