New York Mets Catcher James McCann's Silver Lining in Injury Riddled Season

How James McCann's unlucky season in the injury department may have helped him rediscover his swing.

NEW YORK - The 2022 season has been far from perfect for Mets catcher James McCann, who has endured two prolonged stints on the injured list, mixed with another tough campaign at the plate. 

First, it was mid-May hand surgery to repair a broken hamate bone that cost him six weeks, before an oblique strain suffered nine games after returning from his procedure, which knocked him out for another month. 

Overall, the injury bug has limited McCann to just 45 games this season. When he has been healthy, the backstop has hit an anemic .189 with a .515 OPS in 127 at-bats. 

However, in his last 23 plate appearances, McCann is hitting the ball noticeably harder with a 97.02 mph average exit velocity on balls put in play, per Baseball Savant. 

There could be a reason for this. 

As frustrating as the oblique injury was for McCann, it may have actually benefited him because it allowed his surgically repaired hand to receive an extended period of healing.

"Definitely," McCann told Inside the Mets during the week, of his last stint on the IL helping his hand heal more. "Even in batting practice, the way the ball was jumping off my bat was different. We didn’t realize how much weaker my hand before (as opposed to now)."

In Thursday's 5-3 win over the Dodgers, McCann helped spark an important two-out rally in the seventh inning with a double. The catcher came to the plate 0-for-2 with two line outs of 106.1 mph and 98.2 mph, but he smoked an extra-base hit (102.4 mph) that went all the way to the wall. McCann later scored a crucial insurance run when the Dodgers misplayed Brandon Nimmo's shallow fly out. 

McCann's tenure as a Met has been extremely disappointing, mixed with injuries and lack of production offensively, since the start of 2021. 

McCann signed a four-year, $40 million deal with the Mets prior to the '21 season, but hasn't played close to the level he was on with the Chicago White Sox, in which he was an All-Star in 2019.

Now that he is healthy, he has been able to eliminate some of the bad habits he developed. This has allowed him to make necessary adjustments that allow him to focus on the things that saw him have success with the White Sox from 2019-2020.

"The big thing for me has been going through some adjustments to get back to where I was prior to signing with the Mets," McCann said. "Sometimes bad habits creep in without you even realizing it."

So, what were those adjustments?

"My direction and staying through the baseball to the big part of the field," he said. "I had become very rotational, which didn’t line up with my swing path. 

"I wound up pulling off on the ball, which led to more ground balls last year. This year, between injuries, it’s about trying to get back to where I was."

In a shared catching role with Tomas Nido, McCann has been an asset defensively, given his framing ability behind the plate. But his bat hasn't nearly been productive enough since joining the Mets.

That said, if McCann, with a healthy hand, can re-capture some of his 2019-2020 form at the dish, it will be a bonus out of the No. 9 hole for a Mets team that is trying to capture the NL East crown down the stretch.

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- Mets Owner Steve Cohen Hoping to Keep Jacob deGrom

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