As spring winds down, we wind down our Non-Roster Invitation coverage. Today we’ll look at Daniel Palka who the Mets signed as a free agent out of the Nationals organization.
Daniel Palka got a long look this spring and impressed with his size and his bat power. On April 1st he hit a ball with an exit velocity of 114 mph! Overall he got into 13 games this spring and had 24 PA’s where he hit .238/.333/.333.
Palka was drafted by the Phillies in the 19th round back in 2010. He was drafted by the Diamondbacks a few years later in the round of the 2013 draft out of Georgia Institute of Technology. At this point he started to bounce around different systems – first being traded to the Twins, then being claimed by the White Sox (who he later made his major league debut with). He was then signed by the Nationals last year before coming over to the Mets.
Palka saw significant playing time in the majors back in 2018. He played 124 games for the White Sox with 449 PA’s where he slugged 27 homers and put up a .240/.294/.484 line. The following year he played 30 games and had 93 PA’s where he only hit two homers and had a .107/.194/.179 line.
Palka is an intriguing depth signing for the Mets and flashes quite a bit of power. The difficulty for Palka to make it to the roster is finding a spot for him to play. He plays first and outfield, which is a rather common combination on the current Mets roster. That being said, last year the Mets needed to go deep into their farm system so Palka might make sense to call up in a scenario where the Mets want to protect consistent minor league playing time for someone else.
