Since the Mets traded Ike Davis, Lucas Duda has actually stepped into the role of starting first basemen. He was ready from the start of the season to be in this role, but Terry, even when saying he was going to go with Duda, kept putting Ike in the lineup (plus there is the whole platoon thing with Satin).
It certainly feels that Duda has been better, but has he? Let’s take a look:
- Season Total: .257 BA, .337 OBP, .446 SLG, .783 OPS
- Before Davis Trade: .275 BA, .341 OBP, .500 SLG, .841 OPS
- After Davis Trade: .235 BA, .333 OBP, .382 SLG, .716 OPS
From the that look, he has not been better. Part of the problem is this survey is suffering from a small sample size where Duda went 2-5 and 4-5 before the Davis trade. I believe the reason for this is because of Ike Davis. Before he went over to the Pirates, he had a BA of .208, .367 OBP, .375 SLG and .742 OPS. On OBP it seems Davis has the upper hand, but the way our memories tend to work, we remember the hits, and batting average race clearly goes to Davis. So when we remember the hits, Duda is getting om base more from hits then Davis.
And for fun, Davis has a .185 BA, .290 OBP, .333 SLG, .624 OPS just with the Pirates, and there there is no debate who has been better since that date.
