Reese Kaplan -- OK, So What's Next For the Mets?

OK folks...it’s been more than a week since Christmas arrived and Santa Claus gift wrapped Juan Soto for the Mets’ holiday treat.  (No offense to any non-Christian observers or non-observers intended).

Now that the first major chip has been added to the 2025 roster, what happens next?  Yes, the club has secured the services of Frankie Montas who has had moments but never made an All Star team nor won any of baseball’s performance awards.  He holds a career 4.09 ERA which would rank him right around the 4th or 5th starters on other teams.  

Then they added reliever Clay Holmes with the intention of giving him the Seth Lugo treatment and seeing how he fares mid-career as a newly minted starting pitcher after success in the pen.  His numbers are much better with a 3.05 ERA during his 2021 through 2024 work period primarily for the Yankees.  Still, with a limited repertoire of pitches there is some risk associated with this gamble.

At this point no one is sure what the offense will resemble.  To hear a pessimist like me tell it, you are banking on no first baseman, an injury recovering prospect at third base, a .189 hitter acquired in trade with the Rays, and four 2024 Mets who performed below career expectations in Jeff McNeil, Starling Marte, Francisco Lindor and Brandon Nimmo.  Tyrone Taylor was fairly consistent but his resume is that of a 4th outfielder, not a contending team’s starter. 

With the celebrations, media frenzy and early sale of Soto number 22 jerseys seemingly taking precedence over everything else, the Winter Meetings started and ended without the Mets adding anyone to the Major League Roster.  Granted, none of us were there to eavesdrop on David Stearns’ telephone nor peek at his social media and email accounts, but the assumption is that a great many conversations took place to build some rudimentary groundwork for follow ups from the comfort of baseball executives’ home offices after returning from Dallas.  Steve Cohen certainly seems to want to build a renewable winner.

On the first base front, there’s Pete Alonso as a possibility, of course.  However, if he goes elsewhere since he already turned down the Mets package offered for multiple years then who else is on the radar?  Christian Walker is the closest people would have to remembering Keith Hernandez manning first base, but although he has decent power he is only a career .250 hitter.  His best season was likely 2023 when he slugged 33 HRs and drove in 103 while gaining the second of his three consecutive Gold Gloves.  His last season was played for a salary of $10.9 million.  As a free agent that number will jump significantly, but likely not much higher than a $16-$18 million per year range based upon the number of years offered.  Already three years older than Alonso, he’s an adequate and less costly replacement but not spectacular.

A totally different approach could be taken in the J.D. Martinez mold by targeting first baseman at the tail end of their careers who are available as free agents likely at worst for a 1 year plus 1 year option contract.  This list would include Carlos Santana, Paul Goldschmidt and Justin Turner.  This plan would leave the 1st base position open for 2026 when theoretically Vlad Guerrero, Jr. would be a free agent. 

At 2nd base you have the choices in-house of Luisangel Acuna, Jeff McNeil and Ronny Mauricio.  It would seem that McNeil is probably the least interesting of this trio having strung together back-to-back poor seasons after winning the batting championship in 2022.

At third base the position belongs to Mark Vientos unless he shifts across the diamond to play 1st base in which case the same would-be second basemen could play third or the Mets could look to shake things up by obtaining a veteran on the block like Nolan Arenado.

The outfield right now seems OK with Nimmo in LF and Soto manning RF.  It is in CF where there is certainly room for improvement.  Right now it would seem that Marte is the elder statesman DH unless or until they acquire someone with more run production in his bat. 

Next week we’ll take a closer look at the pitching market for the rotation and for the pen.  The Mets have lots of holes to fill in both places.