Reese Kaplan -- What's Gone Wrong During the 2022 Season?

From almost day one it seemed as if the New York Mets were blessed with a special kind of positivity that led to a lightning fast start out of the gate that suggested the 2022 season was indeed going to be quite special.  A great many things seemed to be happening to contribute to the big balance of wins over losses.  Fans were starting to get giddy.

Lost somewhere in the dust was a look at what has not gone right for the club during this first place performance that has kept the team atop the division almost since Opening Day.  Not everything has been peachy and some folks (including Mack) are beginning to question the focus of Billy Eppler for allowing the problems to linger instead of addressing them head on.  

You can't go anywhere else to start this list but to talk once again about health.  Injuries to Jacob deGrom are unfortunately nothing new.  When it was announced he would not start the season pitching every fifth day due to issues with his arm, it was familiar but not unexpected.  It is good now to see him in rehab with hope starting to grow that he'll be back for most of the second half of the season.

Extended losses of other pitchers were not welcome nor part of the roster planning.  Everyone is well aware of the time off necessitated for Max Scherzer.  Then there was the long term loss of Trevor May.  Now it appears Tylor Megill's hot start is something that may or may not have any 2022-season impact going forward.  Various other pitchers have had their health ups and downs as well.

On the offensive side the club has been a bit luckier save for James McCann's broken hamate bone which made Pat Mazeika a major leaguer during this season.  The combined hitting of McCann, Mazeika and Tomas Nido would not make a cellar dwelling team proud.  

Here's an issue that seems "old Mets" in orientation.  A vivid problem exists but money may be getting in the way of action.  McCann is under contract for another two seasons after this one for a total expenditure of $24.3 million in a backloaded four-year deal.  Given his paltry offensive output he is virtually unmovable.  

Other players have had some short term issues, including J.D. Davis, Brandon Nimmo and various offensive weapons.  None missed major amounts of time and it would appear that it was part of just the day-to-day existence of what professional athletes encounter.

Slumping players, however, are not something you can write off to bad luck nor overexertion triggering their body into a negative response.  From the beginning of the year the Mets had hoped to see more offense out of Eduardo Escobar.  Lately he's turned up the RBI numbers a bit, but he's on pace for about 75 total for the season which is about 25% less than what they'd hoped to get.  

If not for a recent splurge of homers it would look far worse.  As it is, he might hit 20 by year's end.  That's also not commensurate with his salary nor previous efforts primarily in Arizona (and a little in Milwaukee).  His 2023 return will cost $9.5 million and a third year option can be bought out for $500K.  If he hits 20 HRs and drives in 75 it's not great but by today's standards it might be worth that kind of money.  

Right now it's too soon to tell.  With Mark Vientos, Brett Baty and Ronny Mauricio all infielders with strong minor league offensive numbers it's possible that the club may roll the dice on 2023 for improvement before force feeding someone up the ladder.  

Starling Marte started off slowly for the club but gradually put it together.  He demonstrated with his defensive ability and baserunning speed that he was a quality player even if the aggregate numbers were not what was expected.  Right now he's on a pace for probably better than double what his numbers show given his uptick in performance.  

Right now he's at .288 with 9 HRs, 40 RBIs and 10 SBs.  If you just doubled it, that's 18 HRs, 80 RBIs and 20 SBs.  All of those numbers are a little light by Marte standards but my guess is they will improve.  

Francisco Lindor is the toughest nut to crack.  His batting average is still pretty weak at .240 which is 35 points below his career average.  His HR output is also below an average season with 13 thus far, but his RBI production has been first rate with 57 halfway through the season which is earmarked to be his grandest total ever.  With his contract you know he's going to play and people will have to withstand the negatives if he's got the 2nd best RBI totals of any shortstop in baseball.  

Bullpen underperformers, forced spot starters and a variety of failed bench players have all helped contribute to the losses.  Many people were calling for the heads of both Dom Smith and J.D. Davis given their putrid season starts, but after Smith's short term visit to Syracuse he seems to have come back focused. 

Davis, however, is another matter.  He's got his average up to .240 after being sub-Mendoza for much of the season, but he's only hit 2 HRs and only driven in 14.  Smith is now up to .222 but without a single HR and just 17 RBIs.  

The question for the Mets right now is what is a short term problem, what is a long term problem and what must be addressed first.  Billy Eppler is not one to engage the media to discuss his potential moves so it's possible he's wearing out his fingers working the phones and text messages to try to make improvements.  

However, the proof will happen if and when something actually changes.  Until then many of us are left wondering why they were willing to cut Robinson Cano loose at a great financial cost since he was not delivering as expected, yet they have not held other players to a similar standard.