Of all the moves David Stearns made at last year’s MLB trade deadline to improve the New York Mets, the one that should’ve worked was acquiring Ryan Helsley. He was, in some ways, the Freddy Peralta of last summer. Who was to debate the acquisition? It didn’t cost the Mets significant prospect capital. Three players were sent to the St. Louis Cardinals, the headliner was a guy hitting .244 in Single-A at the time of the deal.
Infielder Jesus Baez was the biggest loss for the Mets. He didn’t do all that much in Single-A with the Cardinals last year, posting a .682 OPS to end last season. Stuck in Single-A again to start this season, Baez found his power stroke.
Mashing 14 home runs in 243 trips to the plate, the Cardinals gave him a chance to rise up to Double-A. So far, it’s going really well.
Jesus Baez is quickly becoming a prospect for the Mets to miss
In a short 9-game sample, Baez is hitting .313/.389/.813 in Double-A. The slugging percentage probably caught your eye. It has included 5 home runs in only 36 plate appearances. He now has 19 total this season when combined with the 14 from down in Single-A.
Playing all over the infield with shortstop as his primary position, Baez is only 21 and growing into a Cardinals prospect to watch. Ranked 19th by MLB Pipeline in the St. Louis system, he has a 2028 ETA which he seems to be on track to meet.
Baez’s abilities still have lots of holes. He doesn’t walk much and his batting average (if you care or not) is nothing spectacular. The power, however, should keep him trending upward. He isn’t even close to a strikeout machine.
Back in February, Baez was called out for not playing hard by Keith Law in an updated prospect report. Perhaps he took it a little personally. While failing to run out ground balls doesn’t show up in the stat sheet, you have to figure he hasn’t become a prolific minor league slugger without putting in some work.
