The most interesting guy who played first for the Mets in their full-season minor leagues in 2010? Nick Evans. Yeah, that’s a long way from being The Most Interesting Man in the World, but it’s a start. Evans beat up AA pitching at a .294/.366/.527 rate and kept going in AAA where hit hit .314/.385/.557. Along the way, he totalled 44 doubles and 23 home runs in 125 minor league games. He even hit a little bit in the big leagues this time through, going .306/.324/.472 in 36 AB. He’s always hit lefties much better than righties and could well be a cheap bench piece next year who could play a little first, left or third in a dire emergency.
And that’s the weird part of Evans’ whole season. The Mets did not prepare him for a utility role. He played 12 games at third in AA and four in AAA, and just two in the outfield. Early on, the idea was that playing Evans at the same position everyday would help him get comfortable. At some point, like when he was crushing the ball, he should have played more third and more left to put himself in a position to help the big league club.
– Toby Hyde, MetsMinorLeagueBlog.com.
One of the less-heralded baffling decisions among the many made by the last administration in Flushing was not letting Evans regularly play the outfield in the Minors this season, even though he reportedly requested time there. It will be interesting to see how the next front office handles the oft-forgotten Evans, who has nothing to prove in the Minors and no options remaining on his contract.
Since Evans mashes lefties — including in his small 121 at-bat Major League sample — and offers some defensive flexibility, it seems like a no-brainer to keep him around in the righty bench bat role once filled by Fernando Tatis.
Since left field and third base will be filled by right-handers and right field will likely be manned by a switch-hitter, there probably won’t be a ton of chances for Evans until someone gets hurt. As Duke suggested in the comments section yesterday, Evans could probably combine with Lucas Duda to create a reasonable-hitting corner outfield platoon, though that could be a bit frightening defensively.
That’s really all I have to say about Nick Evans, I guess. Slow day in Metsland. Basically, the dude is too good, too young, and too inexpensive to be passed through waivers, and it will be a pretty damning indictment of the next GM if he or she goes out and spends a couple million on a righty bench bat only to cast Evans aside.
Tedquarters 
A couple years ago (after the 2008 season), I purchased Diamond Mind to run a baseball simulation. I made a 10 team league, had a draft with me picking one team and the computer picking the 9 others. In the end, I never really got into it. But I remember that, despite only 119 PAs in the MLB to that point, the computer drafted Nick Evans for the A’s. The computer went on to platoon Evans against lefties and he mashed the ball.
I really, really have more important things to do than worrying about this, but instead of writing what I’m supposed to be writing over the last couple days, I’ve been trying to come up with ways that the Duda/Evans platoon could happen. I keep trying to find a way to make a trade of Jason Bay for Chone Figgins — it’s like the opposite of a prospect challenge trade! — possible (or even plausible), but I know it almost certainly couldn’t happen. But the usefulness of Evans — which is obvious to everyone but the Mets’ decision-makers, apparently — can’t be repeated often enough for my taste. I think the real moral of the story, though, is that I should get to work.
You really want to see Lucas Duda try to cover all that ground in left for 60 or so games in Citifield? I like Duda’s swing a lot, but he would be a disaster in leftfield in this ballpark. It would be like having Adam Dunn out there, without the homers.
Unless they move the fences in, they are gonna need to field much better outfielders than Duda and Evans. And why trade Bay for Figgins? At least there is a chance Bay will live up to his contract.
I agree that Evans and Duda are both useful players, but not as a starting leftfield tandem in Citifield.
Well, because Figgins could play second base, a position at which the Mets are currently without much help or hope. And because at $9 million or so per year, Figgins is basically being paid like a league-average player through 2014, has generally been a good deal better than that, and because his value’s about as low as it’s likely to get. Fangraphs has Bay at 9.3 WAR over the last three years and Figgins at 9.4. I know it’s not that simple, but what can I say: 1) I’m always partial to young home-grown players over desperate FA signings (even when, like Bay, they’re easy enough to root for) and 2) I’m procrastinating, so I haven’t been stressing the details or plausibility so much.
And you’re probably right about watching Duda and Evans play defense in that particular outfield, although Bay isn’t exactly a wizard out there, either.
Bay was surprisingly mediocre defensively last year. Figgins was terrible offensively in Seattle last year, and the last thing we need is another long-term contract with a past his prime second baseman. $9m per is a lot of money to earmark for second base.
I’m hoping for a one-year deal for Orlando Hudson at 3 or 4 million, or a trade for the arbitration-eligible Kelly Johnson. Either can bat 2nd behind Reyes, or 7th in front of Thole with Pagan 2nd.
Screw work. Baseball is more fun.