NEW YORK — The Mets want to see how strong Gary Sánchez’s bat remains.
Sánchez was added to the active squad ahead of Friday’s opener against the Guardians. Eight-year veteran Sánchez will share the roles of catcher with rookie Francisco Álvarez and designated hitter with a host of others, as he hopes to rediscover some of the clout that has made him one of the best power-hitting catchers in the game, most recently with the Yankees Game has made decade.
“It feels good to be back here in New York after all these years,” Sánchez said through an interpreter. “It’s a different team but it’s still the same city so it’s exciting to be here.”
As a corresponding change, the club chose catcher Michael Pérez to Triple-A Syracuse. To make room for Sánchez in the 40-man squad, the club put Tim Locastro on the 60-day injury list. The Mets also announced that Tomás Nido will begin a rehab stint with Single-A St. Lucie.
For a team that’s been struggling with their energy production over the past few weeks, it’s a low-risk, potentially high-reward gamble. When Sánchez became a free agent earlier this month, the Mets locked him up on a minor league deal on the condition that he could resign from his contract if the team didn’t add him to their roster by May 19. With that deadline approaching, the Mets decided to make the switch on Thursday.
In Sánchez, they’re bringing on a 30-year-old two-time All-Star who has struggled for the past three seasons with .195/.287/.394 slashes for the Yankees and Twins. Sánchez is four years away from his last All-Star season, in which he hit 34 homers with an .841 OPS for the Yankees.
He spent the early part of that season in the Giants’ minor league system, but resigned from that contract in early May to pursue other opportunities.
When he joined Triple-A Syracuse, Sánchez was battling .308 in eight games with a 1.014 OPS.
“As long as you’re healthy and have the opportunity to play baseball, you can do a lot of good,” Sánchez said. “Sometimes you can’t go into the ‘Oh, I want to do what I did in 2017,’ but if you look at it, maybe I’ll do even better if I get the chance.”
The Mets want to see if he can reproduce that type of production at the highest level. In the short term, Sánchez should find a good chance behind the squad, with both Omar Narváez (strained left calf) and Nido (dry eye syndrome) on the injury list. With Narváez and Nido returning in the next two to three weeks, the team should have a better handle on what Sánchez can do.
“We have a lot of respect for what the Yankees, Minnesota and San Francisco tried,” said Mets manager Buck Showalter, referring to Sanchez’s previous teams. “They didn’t have room for him either. So we’ll see. We have made space and we will look at it.”
In addition to his work as a catcher, Sanchez is likely to pull at least some DH bats from Daniel Vogelbach, Tommy Pham, Mark Canha and Mark Vientos. Sánchez, a right-hander, has reverse-platoon splits in his career that could help him in his quest for playing time.
“I’ll be here to do whatever they want,” Sánchez said. “I’ll give 100% when I’m out there on the field. I’m here to help the other players, to help the pitchers and just go out there and win. Because at the end of the day, the most important thing is to go out there and win with this team.”
