Mets place catcher Tomas Nido on the IL, clearing the way for Gary Sanchez

When the New York Mets brought in Gary Sanchez on a Minor League deal yesterday, it seemed like a straight-forward flyer on a player at a position where the team didn’t have much in the way of known quantities. Now, though, it seems like Sanchez may be a more integral part of New York’s plans than we initially thought:

Tomas Nido, who’d been in a timeshare behind the plate with top prospect Francisco Alvarez for the past few weeks (a far-too-equal timeshare, in the eyes of a lot of Mets fans), has been placed on the injured list with what the team is calling a vision issue. The Mets have yet to be any more specific than that, and likely won’t until Nido undergoes more testing.

The team recalled Michael Perez from Triple-A in a corresponding move, but considering his .153/.261/.254 slash line in Syracuse, that doesn’t seem like a permanent solution. Perez will likely keep the backup job warm until Sanchez gets his feet under him with his new organization, and after that, the former All-Star should have every chance to take the spot for good while Nido’s out. Sanchez struggled mightily himself with the San Francisco Giants’ Triple-A affiliate earlier this year, but it wasn’t so long ago that he was a league-average hitter and major source of power. And really, Nido’s -24 OPS+ (no, that’s not a typo) isn’t too high a bar to clear.