Jeff McNeil Hit His Way to a Four-Year Extension

The modern game of baseball is defined by power and strength. You can turn on any game at any time and watch a guy swing his behind off as he launches a 100 mph fastball 450 feet. Of course, that wasn’t always so common — a lot of players used to swing for contact instead of the fences. Today, that skill set is more of a rarity, though there are still a few hitters who choke up on the handle and spray the ball from line to line. Jeff McNeil is perhaps one of the best in this category. Fresh off a batting tile, McNeil was due for a raise in arbitration. Instead, he and the Mets agreed to a four-year, $50 million extension.

The deal buys out McNeil’s two remaining arbitration years and two potential free agent years, taking him through his age-34 season. There’s also a $12.5 million club option for the 2027 season, giving the extension a chance to max out at five years and $62.5 million. On the surface, that seems like a bargain for a player coming off a 5.9 WAR, 143 wRC+ season that also saw him play the best defense of his career according to OAA. However, the free agent market doesn’t tend to be particularly generous to players who are over 30 or rely on contact as much as McNeil does. I asked Dan Szymborski if he could cook up a ZiPS estimate for a McNeil extension and as it turns out, the contract he signed isn’t as much of a bargain as I initially suspected. Including the discounts for the two cost-controlled arbitration years, ZiPS would have offered McNeil a five-year, $69 million extension. That is only $6.5 million more than the maximum the Mets offered when you include the club option. Dan also provided me with McNeil’s projected performance for the life of the contract:

If McNeil performs like that, the Mets will be very pleased! Having a sure-thing above-average hitter on your roster is great, and at only $12.5 million per year, it’s a no-brainer. And as we saw in 2022, he has the potential to be even better than that if he can sustain a BABIP between .330 and .350. That’s tough to do year in and year out, but if he does, the Mets will have themselves a potential five-win player. From McNeil’s point of view, the deal gives him security into his mid-30s. That isn’t an easy feat for non-superstar players nowadays, let alone those who are as reliant on contact as he is.

So far, this all seems mutually beneficial, but there’s an additional reason the Mets would be motivated to finalize a deal like this: payroll certainty. Knowing what you have on the books is very important when you’re potentially trying to retain stars such as Justin Verlander, Max Scherzer, or Pete Alonso, or pursuing future superstar free agents such as Shohei Ohtani and Juan Soto. For a club like the Mets that can play in deeper payroll waters, the more certainty, the better.

Now, we must consider the question that comes up with every extension: how will the player’s skills age? That question is particularly pertinent with a player like McNeil, who has less room for error since he isn’t much of a masher. If McNeil’s hit tool falters, his floor is what we saw in 2021. How do we know that won’t happen again? Will McNeil’s current skill set and mechanics age well as he moves into his mid-30s?

There is no denying that McNeil can flat out hit. There may have been concerns after the aforementioned 2021 season, when he dropped to a 92 wRC+ following three great seasons to start his career, but he calmed those nerves pretty quickly in 2022. He hit the ground running, posting a 153 wRC+ in the first month of the season. From there, he just kept hitting no matter which spot he occupied in the lineup. In a year where the league batting average was at a historic low for the modern era, McNeil still hit .326 in 589 plate appearances, leading the majors; he ended the season with a .326/.382/.454 slash line. Earlier this winter, I wrote about Michael Brantley’s return to Houston, and the ways he uses his body and bat to be accurate with his barrel at different heights of the strike zone. McNeil has the exact same skill. Let me show you what that looks like:

April 25

May 28

August 9

August 23

Away and off the plate, low and in, up and away, and under the zone. Four different locations and heights, all resulting in extra base hits. That is impressive barrel adjustability. He may not be drilling the baseball or lighting up the exit velocity leaderboards, but McNeil is giving himself a chance to get his barrel on the ball no matter where the pitch is thrown. In the first swing, he delays his rotation as long as possible, makes deep contact, and elevates the ball down the line. He stood tall knowing he couldn’t get his barrel in this location without an upright posture. The next swing is the exact opposite. He starts his rotation as soon as he recognizes the pitch inside. He then gets his barrel far out in front of the plate by tipping it almost perpendicular to the ground and manages to yank a laser down the line while keeping the ball fair. That isn’t something many hitters can do.

The next two swings both entered the strike zone on the outer third, but at different heights. Let’s take the swing from August 23 first. Since McNeil can spray the oppo gap well, and that is the largest part of Yankee Stadium, Harrison Bader was shaded that way. That left a lot of space for McNeil to play with in the pull-side gap. Against a pitcher like Frankie Montas with a diving sinker, McNeil was able to sell out on being early because he knew it meant he could match the plane of the ball and elevate it. He didn’t crush this one either, but it was still an easy double because of the unoccupied space out there. Similarly against Mike Minor, McNeil took an early hack on a fastball moving across the top of the zone into the meaty part of his bat. What differed between this and the swing against Montas was that he held his posture up nice and tall.

These four swings are all perfectly representative of how McNeil uses his 80-grade contact ability to maintain a high level of performance despite not having much power. If he continues to do this, he will age fine. This is a unique skill that will provide value even if his raw abilities drop off as he ages. And I haven’t even touched on his improving plate discipline around the edges of the strike zone, or as Statcast calls it, the shadow zone. After consistently grading negatively in terms of run value in the shadow zone during his career, McNeil finally turned it around last season by taking more than he ever has around the edges.

Improving plate discipline and an incredible hit tool are the perfect pair of skills for McNeil to age well as he enters his mid-30s. The Mets showed they are willing to bet on that skill set, and now McNeil will remain in New York for the next four seasons while hoping to be a key contributor to a World Series winning team.