Reese Kaplan -- Does Luis Rojas Have Enough to Win?

Where do you expect the Mets to finish in 2020?  To some, the club is incomplete without improving the defense, the bullpen and the bench.  To others the club is just fine building on what they accomplished in 2019.  To a larger majority, however, the club is full of unknowns, including the health of various players, the inexperience of another unknown manager and upcoming changes in ownership that may or may not propel them into a new direction led not by the Wilpons but by Steve Cohen. 

Let’s look at the good stuff first.  When your core includes Pete Alonso, Jeff McNeil, Amed Rosario, JD Davis, Michael Conforto, Brandon Nimmo, Wilson Ramos, the starting rotation and hopefully what’s an improved bullpen, yeah, that’s a contending ballclub.  If you get anything like you’d expected out of Robinson Cano, Edwin Diaz, Jeurys Familia and Dellin Betances then you are very much going to find yourself in the thick of things come September.  Add in ANY contributions at all from Yoenis Cespedes and Jed Lowrie and you could be looking at doing something in October other than packing for a long winter.

Can the club be improved?  Absolutely!  There was precious little done during the off-season between the managerial snafu.  Yes, they signed a solid if unhealthy relief pitcher in Dellin Betances.  They are hopefully getting back some of their injured players for solid contributions.  The expensive Juan Lagares was replaced by a similar and less expensive Jake Marisnick who hopefully knows how to hit without tips from the Astros’ video system.  Todd Frazier and Zack Wheeler walked out the door.  Some cried some tears for Wheeler (at least until they saw what the Phillies wound up paying to secure his services).  Many were hoping the Mets would acquire more solid and healthy talents or parlay some of their excess into meaningful pieces for now or in the near future. 

Right now it seems the club is a little overfilled with outfielders and infielders, a bit thin on catching and very tentative in the bullpen given what 2019 demonstrated in the box score.  They are banking on an elder statesman at 2B to rebound as he showed capable in September.  They don’t know what to make of Cespedes and Lowrie.  They don’t know where the ABs will originate for JD Davis and Dom Smith.  No one is even sure what position Jeff McNeil and his hopefully healed hand will be playing. 

No one should be envying Luis Rojas for his newly crowned job as manager of the Mets.  He knows a great many of the younger ballplayers having managed them in the lower minors.  On the other hand, will veterans like Cano, Cespedes and Lowrie take orders from someone their same age?  Will he be able to juggle effective bats with suspect gloves into the lineup on a regular basis?  Will he advocate the front office instead parlay the solid wood for some superior leather?   Or will he assume his power and intellect will be enough given what he has at his disposal?

Right now people are chomping at the bit for actual baseballs to be thrown, hit and fielded as if games were at stake.  Is what they have enough to win?  Probably, yes.  Could it be improved?  Probably, yes as well.  Will it be improved?  That’s the biggest mystery of them all and the fodder for many adult-beverage infused debates with fellow fans.