James McCann headed for rehab assignment, hoping for quick return to Mets

NEW YORK — James McCann knew he was on the verge of a return when he was no longer thinking about his hands on the bat.

McCann had surgery to repair a broken hamate bone in his left hand on May 17. While doing hitting work in the last week, he began to shift his attention to the frustration of rolling over a pitch or a mishit.

"That was a big step in that direction because that’s when I could start thinking about a rehab assignment," McCann said. "That’s when I feel I could do things and not look at a counter and see how many swings I did and shutting down after taking X amount of swings. That was definitely satisfying."

The Mets starting catcher will move one step closer to a return on Thursday as he begins a rehab assignment with Class AA Binghamton down in Bowie, Md.

The original estimated recovery for McCann's injury was six weeks. He is in his fourth week since surgery and does not expect to be long with the Rumble Ponies before a return.

"We’ll assess him each day to see what he’s doing the next day and how long," Buck Showalter said.

In 21 games before the injury, McCann was slashing .196/.266/.286 with one home run, five runs and six RBI. However, his impact behind the plate cannot be understated. McCann is in the league's 96th percentile in catch framing, with a 51 percent strike rate.

And in his last nine games before the injury, McCann was 7-of-24 for a .292/.308/.333 slash line during that stretch.

On the way back to playing and with stitches still in his left hand, McCann said he was catching with his right hand to stay in shape.

"It’s to keep my legs in shape and the other thing I realized is you focus so much in the offseason, spring training and techniques and what you’re doing and now I’m trying to teach my right hand to do it," McCann said. "I think there’s a lot of benefit of trying to teach this side something that the other side already does."

In 18 games since McCann's surgery, Tomas Nido is 15-of-57 (.263) with seven runs and seven RBI. Patrick Mazeika is batting .186 with a home run, three runs and four RBI in 15 games since being called up on May 13.

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Trusting the process

There are times in baseball when the stats don't tell the whole story.

That has certainly been the case for J.D. Davis this season. While he is only slashing .263/.346/.381, Davis is in the top one percent of MLB with a 64.6 hard-hit percentage. His expected batting average is .313 and expected slugging percentage .570.

"He gives himself a chance to be successful," Showalter said. "I see all the work he puts in. He’s prepared. He’s enjoys being prepared. He enjoys competing during the game."

One of the reasons that Dominic Smith was sent down to Class AAA Syracuse was to ensure that Smith received more regular at-bats.

Since Smith was sent down on May 31, Davis is beginning to see the results of his contact-happy approach. In the month of June, Davis is 12-of-36 (.333) with a home run, two doubles, four RBI and seven runs scored in 11 games.

The biggest hit during that stretch was an RBI double in the 10th inning in the series finale against the Dodgers that helped lift the Mets to a 5-4 win. He also hit the go-ahead home run in the fourth inning of Sunday's 4-1 victory over the Angels.

"I think some of the adjustments we’ve made, we’ve been able to create some more at-bats for him to try and take advantage of some stuff we knew was going to turn if he kept hitting the ball hard," Showalter said. "He likes to hit, he likes to compete and he really likes to win. He’s a good teammate playing or not playing. He’s a very consistent."

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Ball in play

The first inning of Tuesday's victory over the Brewers encompassed one of the many ways that the Mets have been successful this season.

With long at-bats and some lucky hits by putting the ball in play, the Mets were able to scratch across three runs off Adrian Houser and force him to throw 37 pitches to get to the Brewers bullpen early.

"Some of these pitchers don’t pitch in the strike zone consistently for three strikes," Showalter said. "They don’t. Very few of those guys do. A lot of times, they’re called closers. The way things get embraced is if it wins games and in some cases you get compensated for them. … Our guys have embraced the compensation of winning the game."

After nine pitches, Nimmo got the offense in gear with a double into right-center field. Jeff McNeil encapsulated that approach perfectly by knocking a chopper up the middle that glanced off the glove of Houser and went for a double into shallow right field.

Andrew Tredinnick is the Mets beat writer for NorthJersey.com. For unlimited access to all Mets analysis, news, trades and more, please subscribe today and download our app. 

Email: atredinnick@gannett.com Twitter: @andrew_tred

This article originally appeared on NorthJersey.com: James McCann injury: NY Mets catcher to start rehab assignment