Reese Kaplan -- How Does the 2019 Offense Stack Up?

As much as the current Mets team was expected to live and die by its pitching, many are not aware how historic this offense has been.  Until this year, the Mets’ high water mark for a full season was the 1999 squad who managed to generate 854 runs over the course of the year.  The current Mets team is on a pace to shatter that record with a projected 864 runs if they hold true to offensive course (and interestingly without their nearly $30 million man in the lineup). 

Now most of us remember well that 1999 squad as it featured what was called by no less an authority than Sports Illustrated in a Tom Verducci article, “The greatest infield ever?”  It featured highly underrated John Olerud at 1^st base, fan favorite Edgardo Alfonso at 2^nd base, 3-time Gold Glover Rey Ordonez at SS and 6-time Gold Glover and 2-time All-Star Robin Ventura at 3B.  Behind the plate was none other than future Hall of Famer Mike Piazza.  Yeah, that was a pretty impressive bunch, alright.  Then in the outfield you had another Hall of Famer in Rickey Henderson in LF, Brian McRae in CF with speed demon (and hold-your-breath outfielder) Roger Cedeno in RF. 

How does that compare with the current squad?  Well, you have Pounding Pete Alonso at 1^st base, future Hall of Famer Robinson Cano at 2^nd base, thus far underachieving Amed Rosario at SS and some combination of Todd Frazier and J.D. Davis at 3B.  Wilson Ramos handles the catching duties and your outfield is mostly Jeff McNeil in LF, Brandon Nimmo in CF and Michael Conforto in RF.  Oh yeah, there’s Jed Lowrie and Yoenis Cespedes both waiting in the wings, too.  Even without the Cuban slugger and last year’s AL All-Star infielder, the Mets are off to their best offensive start ever with some folks like Nimmo and Rosario with plenty of room to improve. 

While that 1999 squad was indeed formidable, they were not sustainable.  The following year Olerud left for greener pastures and replaced by future actor Todd Zeile miscast at 1^st base, Ordonez was replaced by the immortal Mike Bordick who only cost us some scrub named Melvin Mora, and the entire outfield was overturned, replaced left to right with Benny Agbayani, Jay Payton and Derek Bell (who was part of the price of getting Mike Hampton). 

The other Mets run scoring teams to consider were the 2006, 2007 and 2008 teams whose nucleus included Carlos Delgado, Carlos Beltran, Jose Reyes and David Wright all three years, Paul LoDuca and Luis Castillo for two of them, then one year apiece for the likes of Cliff Floyd and Moises Alou.  Other players included forgettable hitters like Xavier Nady, Ryan Church, Brian Schneider, Jose Valentin, Fernando Tatis and Shawn Green.

Surprisingly the 1986 World Series Champions did not make the over-800 runs list, but the following season the club hit that lofty plateau on the sweet swings of Gary Carter, Keith Hernandez, Wally Backman, Darryl Strawberry, Howard Johnson and the sort-of platoon of Mookie Wilson and Lenny Dykstra.  That era’s no-stick shortstop was Rafael Santana. 

Whether or not the Mets can maintain their early season pace depends a lot on pitchers learning to adjust to Alonso and McNeil, Rosario adjusting to the pitchers and seeing more productivity from Brandon Nimmo.  The additions of Lowrie and Cespedes, while making for some lineup challenges, should only reinforce an already formidable offense.