Two games into the post All Star effort and the Mets find themselves at a .500 record against the Marlins in their Friday and Saturday games. That leaves eight more games for the Mets to engineer incremental buys to address the need to reinforce for the August and September race to enter post season baseball in October.
If they go 4-4 over the next eight games then they will be in that middle ground of not improving their current three games over .500 record. There will be a grand total of ten more games played but still a trio over which is good news but not the best possible outcome.
As outlined on Saturday, this result would suggest minor roster enhancements by improving the bullpen, the outfield and the bench with likely veteran fringe players from other clubs who would not cost a fortune in terms of money or returning assets to acquire.
If they are more successful and pad that number of games over .500 then it would be easier for the club to make those kinds of changes. Under no circumstance does it seem as if they are blockbuster deals on David Stearns’ radar as it would be pretty shocking if it indeed happened.
The third alternative would be the Mets doing poorer than .500 during the remaining 8 games before the the end of the July trading deadline. If is entirely possible for that to happen as well and it is only under this scenario that you might see something of a repeat of July from a year ago when the club set out to fortify the minor league organization by trading away some household name players.
This approach would take an awful lot of courage as it signals to the fan base that you are conceding October baseball for 2024. You are instead looking to make for a stronger team in 2025 (and beyond).
Right now we all know the names who could be on the block. Let’s instead take the shorter list of who is pretty much guaranteed to be a 2025 Met. Francisco Lindor, Francisco Alvarez, Brandon Nimmo, Mark Vientos, Edwin Diaz, Kodai Senga will be a part of the future.
Then you have Pete Alonso, J.D. Martinez, Starling Marte, Jeff McNeil, Harrison Bader, the rest of the veterans in the starting rotation with expiring contracts and pretty much the rest of the veterans in the bullpen could all be factored into a wholesale roster reconstruction. Throw Brett Baty into that mix as well. The bench with the exception of Jose Igelesias also is ripe for the picking.
The question for the front office, the fans and the media is what is it that the Mets really want? Ideally they’d like to fight for more than a first round one-and-done in October. However, even the returns of Kodai Senga, Starling Marte and Sean Reid-Foley may not be enough to get much further in the playoffs unless there are major hot streaks from some of the underperforming players.
You saw how ecstatic everyone became with Jeff McNeil’s 3-hit, 2-homer game on Friday (in a losing effort). If he hit more like a .280+ hitter the results could be a major shot of offensive adrenaline.
Bringing in veteran bench players as they did in 2015 can have a positive effect, but it’s temporary. At year’s end they need to rebuild the reserve bench all over again.
That other one where they do salary dumps on expiring contracts or paying down the deals that have more than one year to continue is extremely difficult to do. Steve Cohen did it last year. It could happen again. The firestorm in the media and among the fans would be horrific.
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Nothing’s easy and the .500 start to this ending part of July is making it still unclear which approach is the best one.
4 comments:
A disappointing 3 days, and a confusing kick off for Stearns to decipher.
The good thing is no other team that is trying to win a Wild Card is burning up the season. Even the injured Braves could be caught here.
Once again this team has not played up to playoff standards.
Where did I put that Blow It Up plan... ???
Like I said before, wait until after the Braves series and re-evaluate at that point. For whatever reason, the Marlins always seem to have the Mets number and the Mets always seem to play at their worse against them.
I am by nature a realist and to me, this team is not build to go far in the post-season. It is just too incomplete and to make it right, it would require trading prospects that the Mets simply cannot afford to trade.
As usual, the Mets don't seem to be able to follow a path and stick with it. They want to build for the future while considering trading that future for a wild card with a very low chance to go far into the post season.
I ask you, is that not what the Mets have been doing in like for ever?. Has it work?. Stearns was hired to build a team that would be able to compete on a yearly basis. It is not ready.
Stearns should not listen to players who are asking for re-enforcement because the players asking are the ones mostly responsible for the way the Mets are failing right now.
What has the Great Alonso done lately? JD Martinez? McNeil?. Is Scott in the rotation actually better than Butto in the rotation?.
Why does Terry Collins want to be continue to play Steward and Taylor at the expense of Iglesias and McNeil?.
Don't mortgage the future, get the team payroll under control and 2025 should be the year where the future Mets team start to come together.
Viper, I think Ryan Clifford, who just turned 21, is showing tons of power and promise right now, and could be an August 2025 call up to play 1st base in 2025, so why sign Alonso?
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