Observations from Mack - The Mets Outlook

Good morning.

I’m having such a hard time getting this post started. Do I talk about the five game winning streak? Do I talk about the latest fold against the Cubs? Do I pump this team up? Or do I just tell the truth and tell you what I think?

I’ll go with truth.

What I’m not going to do is rant that Ronny Mauricio should be playing in Queens, or that Daniel Vogelbach should retire, buy a guitar, and change his name to Dan Fogelberg. Also, not play Mark Vientos all this time or quote some of the low batting averaged from the so-called big stars on this team. No, I’ll leave that to the other writers, you, and your Mets friends on places like Facebook or Twitter.

For me, it starts, and ends with pitching.

And continuing with all the things I’m not going to do here, I’m not going write about the age of the starters, the pitchers traded, or the injuries incurred. Every team has pitching injuries, even big teams like the Braves and Yankees, but they don’t seem to be having little problems posting win-loss records that qualify them for the playoffs.

I don’t want to look back at what already has happened this season, but this division is being led by a team that looks like it will easily post up a 100+ win season. Teams that do this don’t have fan bases that are excited that “after one more bad outing, we can replace Cookie with Joey”.

The Mets, simply put, do not have enough talent in both their starters and pen, to reach the playoffs this season. Finished. Done. Over and out. Kaput.

I will step out and focus on one area though. No teams gets to or goes deep in the playoffs without three decent starters. We all know that the only problem that Justin Verlander and Max Scherzer has is their age-related injury potention… well, that and Max’s Vitalis problem… but the Mets needed Kodai Senga to become a positive factor this year in the rotation. He hasn’t. The league has quickly realized that if you don’t swing when he dishes up the forkball, it’s going to wind up in the dirt before it gets to the catcher and the ump will call it correctly as a ball. Looks like a strike when it starts. Ends going down under.

So, they had a good outing from Cookie, both Joey Lucchese and David Peterson are pitching well  in Syracuse, and Tylor Megill is turning out decent SP5 numbers. Enough? Hell no.

We know that Lucchese has never really pitched well at the major league level, and Peterson seems to have forgotten how to. One good Carrasco outing doesn’t make  a season.

I look at this rotation and see two old guys that probably only produce their worse outings going forward in the range of six innings pitched with three runs given up (oops). And Megill will do just fine in the SP5 slot. This is the good news.

The secret of where this team goes in the future lies in the SP3 and SP4 slots, especially after they play their last game today against “easy” competition for quite awhile.

And, by the way, how did that playing against easy competition work out?

And I haven’t even written here about a limited talented pen that is already overworked and hitting the wall.

Beginning Tuesday, the Mets play 3x Phils, 3x Toronto, 3x Braves, 3x Pirates, 2x Yankees 3x Cardinals, 3x Astros, 3x Phils, 3x Brewers, and end the month of June with three games against the Giants.

This current team can barely stay above .500 against easy teams and now this smacks you in the head.

There are some things they can do…

In my opinion:

-Senga’s fork is consistently ending out of the zone. Batters have figured that out and are working their at-bat towards a walk. Walks are good (just ask Vogy), but only if you get the rest of the batters out. Is the American baseball causing his pitches to dive down too much? A simple solution here would be to teach Kodai to start these pitches out shoulder high so then still end of out of the zone but just below the box.

-Prematurely move Mike Vasil to AAA-Syracuse. Sure, it’s a little early, but he does have eight starts for the B-Mets. Movement usually begins in the 10 starts range. He was pulled early last outing but I really don’t see an issue here. In wartime, poorly trained troops are very often sent to the front to continue their training in case the war ready line begins thinning out. Well, this is a war and the Mets may need this guy in a pinch.

-Get Jose Quintana on a steady rehab to get back by mid-June. Maybe he can help here.

-Complete the conversion of bats needed to create more 6+ runs per game results. Promote Ronny Mauricio and put him on second. Move the Mets’ best hitter, Jeff McNeil to full time left. Make Mark Vientos your full time DH facing both right and left-handed pitching. And keep Brett Baty on third and Francisco Alvarez behind the plate as regulars (and get Alvy out of that 9^th at-bat slot and move him beind the Polar Bear).

-And get those under-producing bats out of the lineup. Make them utility players, DFA them, trade them, send them down, or release them. I really don’t care, but it would sure help if you could trade for one decent reliever for one or all of them.

-Memorial Day begins the “win the series” plan. This especially works against teams you play in your own division. Trust me. You win your series, you win it all.

Will this make the Mets a playoff team?  

Well, only if some teams come back to earth like the Pirates seem to be doing right now. Let’s project that the Braves, Dodgers, and Brewers win their divisions. My guess is Arizona is a lock for Wild Card #1. That leaves two more between the Pirates, the Mets, the Giants, the Marlins, the Padres, and the Phillies.

It can happen. 

I don’t believe it will, but I welcome the Mets proving me wrong.