{"id":78560,"date":"2025-12-22T23:11:18","date_gmt":"2025-12-22T23:11:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/78560\/"},"modified":"2025-12-22T23:11:18","modified_gmt":"2025-12-22T23:11:18","slug":"how-jorge-polanco-prepared-for-his-mets-first-base-chance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/78560\/","title":{"rendered":"How Jorge Polanco prepared for his Mets first base chance"},"content":{"rendered":"

Jorge Polanco is banking that his work last season at first base with the Mariners \u2014 albeit not in games \u2014 has served as a good foundation as he attempts to play the position regularly.<\/p>\n

On an introductory Zoom call Monday, the new Mets infielder said he was offering his services to teams this offseason as a first baseman, second baseman and third baseman.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo when the Mets asked if I could play a little bit of first, play a little bit of third I was definitely willing to do that right away,\u201d Polanco said through an interpreter.<\/p>\n

Polanco, who arrived on a two-year contract worth $40 million<\/a> only days after Pete Alonso\u2019s departure through free agency, said he spent plenty of time last season learning the nuances of first base through his work with Mariners coaches Perry Hill and Manny Acta.<\/p>\n

But Polanco, 32, only played one inning at the position in a season he produced a .265\/.326\/.495 slash line with 26 homers and 78 RBIs.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think the thing that made me the most comfortable in offering my services as the first baseman is just the confidence that Perry Hill had instilled in me and all the work that I had done with him to make me comfortable to play first base,\u201d Polanco said.<\/p>\n

Polanco\u2019s bat has been the most significant added by president of baseball operations David Stearns this winter. The team also acquired Marcus Semien in a trade with the Rangers for Brandon Nimmo before Alonso accepted the Orioles\u2019 $155 million offer over five years. The Mets also lost Edwin Diaz to the Dodgers on a three-year contract worth $69 million.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was definitely surprising that they both left, but at the same time it\u2019s also a business,\u201d Polanco said. \u201cEdwin Diaz is one of the best closers in baseball. Pete Alonso is one of the best first baseman in baseball, so it did surprise me a bit. But once you get into free agency, the business does take over. And there\u2019s a lot as baseball players that we can\u2019t control, but at the same time it\u2019s just one of those things that ended up happening.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"JorgeJorge Polanco Diamond Images\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

Polanco struggled to a .651 OPS in 2024 as he struck out a whopping 29.3 percent of the time. Last season he sliced that number almost in half, striking out only 15.6 percent of the time, leading to his reemergence.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was both physically and from a mechanical standpoint that I was able to change,\u201d Polanco said. \u201cI think everybody knew that I was dealing with a knee injury for the better part of 2024, but now I feel a lot better. I have a hitting coach that I have been working with and we kind of got back to where I was early in my career, where I wasn\u2019t striking out as much. I was putting the ball more in play, and I was really battling the at-bat. Once we were able to switch mechanics and also the health got a lot better, I was able to return to the player I was early in my career.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Jorge Polanco is banking that his work last season at first base with the Mariners \u2014 albeit not…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":78561,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[20,3473,9,11,320,10,5419,319],"class_list":{"0":"post-78560","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york","8":"tag-mlb","9":"tag-mlb-free-agency","10":"tag-new-york","11":"tag-new-york-headlines","12":"tag-new-york-mets","13":"tag-new-york-news","14":"tag-pete-alonso","15":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78560","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=78560"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78560\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/78561"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=78560"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=78560"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=78560"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}