The Mets are planning to move Eric Chavez back to a hitting coach role, reports Andy Martino of SNY. Current hitting coach Jeremy Barnes isn’t going anywhere, with Chavez set to serve as a co-hitting coach alongside him.
Chavez, 46 next month, played in the majors from 1998 to 2014. The Mets hired him to be their hitting coach prior to the 2022 campaign but he got moved to bench coach duties in 2023, with Barnes taking over his previous title. The club has made some shifts to their dugout staff in recent months, with manager Buck Showalter having been fired and replaced by Carlos Mendoza. Amid those changes, it seems Chavez will go back to focusing on the hitting side of things.
It’s clear that Chavez is quite respected around the game, having been connected to managerial openings throughout the league in recent years. Just a few weeks ago, he was considered for the Padres’ managerial vacancy. That job is still open but it doesn’t appear Chavez will be taking it, instead sticking with the Mets.
Evaluating the impact one individual coach can be difficult when teams consist of dozens of players of varying skill levels and multiple staffers of different kinds, but Martino suggests the players on the team will be pleased, adding a second post that says Chavez was viewed favorably by the club for his work in 2022.
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