Reese Kaplan -- Glimmers of Hope in the Darkness

_{While the majority of Mets fans are gnashing their choppers over the plight of injuries that’s befallen the team, there have been some somewhat magical developments during the cow poop that is the 2017 season that have to varying degrees flown somewhat under the radar.  Towards that end, it could change some of the conventionally accepted wisdom of who will stay and who will go come 2018.}

_{Has anyone paid attention to what Lucas Duda has done since returning from the DL?  This year he’s actually hitting lefties better than righties – a problem for him in the past.  His batting average is up to .278 which is the highest mark since his .290 rookie campaign.  He’s fielding with aplomb and seemingly even more confident with the media.  It was assumed that he would be allowed to depart at year’s end as a free agent but his season as a 31-year old may actually show he’s figured this game out.  That opens up the question of what to do with Dom Smith?  Obviously the often miserly Wilpons would rather see a minimum wage alternative like Smith patrolling first base than the $13 million or so per year it would take in a multi-year deal to secure Duda, but there’s a LOT of money coming off the books next season.  Could Smith instead be part of a package to improve another area?  He’s doing well in AAA but approximately at the same level he did in AA without the benefit of the hitting paradise of Las Vegas.} 

_{Wilmer Flores is finally getting some steady ABs and he too is performing at a higher level than has been seen before in his major league career.  His issue now is figuring out what to do with him defensively, much like the Mets faced with a certain lefty doubles machine now plying his trade in the nation’s capital.  It may indeed be that his future will be at 2B where his throws are far less challenging considering that Neil Walker is playing on expensive borrowed time.  The Gavin Cecchini experiment thus far has been a failure in AAA offensively though his defensive performance at 2B has been quite good.  Asdrubal Cabrera has logged plenty of time at 2B and has an affordable option, but his defensive woes and lackluster offensive performance don’t necessarily make it an automatic that he’ll be invited back.}

_{There’s not much to say about Michael Conforto at this point but it’s nice to see him get a chance despite his relative youth given the crusty veteran Curtis Granderson.  Who here believes Conforto would be playing (let alone in the majors) had Yoenis Cespedes not turned up injured?  He took the opportunity created and ran with it.  Now it will be interesting to see what they do going forward with Granderson flirting with the Mendoza line and Conforto getting heavy write-in consideration for an All Star berth.  One of these things is not like the other…}

_{When Jay Bruce arrived last year it seemed a great trade – a good but not great prospect going to Cincinnati in return for the league’s leading RBI producer.  Givven his horrific Mets debut there were a great many advocating letting him walk away rather than picking up his $13 million option.  I was one of the few who said you had to retain him at that rate because 30/90 hitters don’t grow on trees.  His torrid start has had a lot of people dining on crow, and even though he’s cooled off considerably you can’t argue with his .248/13/36 one third of the way through the season.  The question becomes what his future is in Queens?  There’s very little in the way of outfield talent in the minors and although he’ll be pricy, this off season indicated that there was not as much a market for him as you would have believed.  One way to go would be to sell high right now and get some prospect help and another would be to try to work out a contract extension while you have exclusive negotiating leverage.  In either case, you can’t necessarily think it’s a fait accompli that he’s a goner at year’s end.}

_{After two years away from the game no one knew exactly what to expect of Zack Wheeler.  His control is definitely not where you’d like it to be, but he’s pitching like a solid member of the rotation and hopefully as the rust continues to shake off he can achieve better command.  I think if anyone had said that at this point of the season Wheeler would be pitching regularly every 5th day and sporting a 3.72 ERA most people would have signed up for that.}

_{Robert Gsellman got off to a very shaky start after a wondrous debut in 2016, but lately he appears to have turned a corner.  Tyler Pill’s relief debut was highly forgettable but then he turned in a brilliant start and another credible one.  Maybe they are not the final answers but at least there are no more Rafael Montero, Adam Wilk, Tommy Milone and Sean Gilmartin starts in the foreseeable future.} 

_{After an initial rude awakening at the big league level, Paul Sewald made himself into the team’s best right handed relief option.  He did get hammered in a game over the weekend, but that was a course correction, law of average or whatever you want to call it.  The fact is he strikes people out and is much more often than not a steadying presence out of the bullpen.  That’s not bad for a 27 year old rookie who was not even on the 40-man roster.}  

_{There will come a time when Sandy Alderson rediscovers that mechanism called a "trade" in which he sends one or more of his resources packing for talent in return.  The dead weight without a Mets future like Curtis Granderson, Jose Reyes, Neil Walker and possibly Asdrubal Cabrera won't be here forever.  The next 4 weeks determine if the Mets are buyers or sellers, but as Alderson has shown us, he's very skilled at doing nothing as he did all off-season when he brought not a single new major league player onto a team that was one and done.  Even if nothing happens in 2017, there will be a lot of new faces for sure in 2018.}