Reese Kaplan - What would constitute a Happy New Year for Mets fans?

After all, the bright and active start to the off-season has slowly reached a temporary denouement, perhaps a function of the holiday season, perhaps a matter of “waiting for the market to come to him” or perhaps waiting for the big fruit to land somewhere which might break the logjam of transactions taking place.  As long as ample resources are available in the free agent marketplace many teams might not be inclined to entertain trade offers.

The rationale of waiting does indeed have some merit to it.  After all, pricing is determined by the desirability and scarcity of resources.  As long as a Nelson Cruz was available, for example, what is the need to give up both resources and money to get a Nick Castellanos?

PC - Mack

To be sure there’s still a lot of work to do.  The Mets need at BARE minimum one more outfielder and that is all only if you consider guys like Dom Smith or Jeff McNeil viable alternative outfielders.  Throw two walking wounded in that mix – Travis d’Arnaud and TJ Rivera.  

If you don’t consider any of those four professional caliber outfielders or harbor serious doubts Juan Lagares can be penciled in for pretty much 81 straight games until at the earliest Yoenis Cespedes is due back, then up that to two needed outfielders.

PC - Mack

The bullpen work was off to a great start with the addition by trade of Edwin Diaz and by free agency of Jeurys Familia.  Joined by Seth Lugo, that’s a good start.  Robert Gsellman and the younger pitchers are all very much works in progress and right now the only lefty of the bunch is the short term trial of Daniel Zamora.  One would think another lefty should be at the top of BVW’s shopping list.  

With Andrew Miller off the boards, there are still available options in free agency.  Zach Britton, Jerry Blevins, Tony Sipp, Justin Wilson, Luis Avilan and Oliver Perez are all there to the highest bidder.

There are plenty of right handed options as well if you are willing to go in that direction given the story already being spun about reverse platoon splits of the existing relief corps.  This group would include Craig Kimbrel, David Robertson, Kelvin Herrera, Cody Allen, Ryan Madson, Adam Ottavino, Adam Warren, Sergio Romo and many others. 

There are many who would argue that perhaps the Mets are moving in the wrong direction and should instead look at starting pitchers with Daniel Zamora and career starter Jason Vargas into a reliever.  He wouldn’t be the only pitcher in his thirties to make that transition, particularly after his less than stellar sequel tenure with the Mets.  

The rationale would be that if you added another good starter who might help you win every fifth day while Vargas only plays in mop-up duty or blowouts.  If he suddenly rediscovers how to pitch then he could earn his way into emergency starter duty or when injuries happen.

On the FA starter market there are quite a few names worth considering for this role, headed by James Shields, Dallas Keuchel, Ervin Santana, Gio Gonzalez, Shelby Miller, Francisco Liriano, Hisashi Iwakuma, Jeremy Hellickson, Ross Detwiler and even Bartolo Colon.

Until a large number of free agency signings begins to take place there’s likely little movement taking place in on the trade front. Consequently I think BVW ought to be pushing REAL HARD on the trade front now for any prospective targets.  The prices will only go up afterwards.