A Fast Start — and the First Hairline Cracks
This is the first installment in the 2025 Mets Season Review Series. Each post steps back from day-to-day noise to diagnose what actually happened, why it mattered, and what it revealed about the organization beneath the results.
📊 Monthly Snapshot (March–April)
By any surface measure, this was an excellent opening month.
🧮 Outcomes vs Expectations
(Actual vs Pythagorean vs BaseRuns)
How to read this:
Pythagorean evaluates whether wins aligned with runs scored and allowed.
BaseRuns estimates how many runs should have been scored and been allowed based on underlying components (hits, walks, HR, etc.).
Takeaway:
April performance was strong and mostly earned. The Mets slightly outperformed BaseRuns, a common early-season effect driven by sequencing, bullpen freshness, and clean leverage usage — not unsustainable luck.
⚾️ Run Creation (Monthly)
Runs Scored Distribution
Key signals
Mets scored 5+ runs in 15 of 26 games (58%)
Production was effective but top-heavy
Low-output games were almost automatic losses
🛡️ Run Prevention (Monthly)
Runs Allowed Distribution
Key signals
Mets allowed ≤4 runs in 18 of 26 games (69%)
Once opponents reached 5+ runs, wins nearly vanished
The margin for error was already narrow
📈 Quantitative Analysis (Consolidated)
Run Creation
The offense delivered volume and power early, but relied on clustered scoring. The team lacked a consistent “middle band” offense that could grind out wins in lower-scoring environments.
Run Prevention
Pitching results were excellent on paper, supported by early health and bullpen freshness. However, the win curve was steep — allowing 5 runs often proved fatal.
Interaction Effect
This roster required both solid offense and clean run prevention to win. There was no independent fail-safe. That dependency becomes critical as the season wears on.
🧠 Qualitative Context
This strong start occurred despite early structural warning signs:
Sean Manaea and Frankie Montas entered the season already compromised, removing two projected innings sources before Opening Day.
Starters were effective, but rarely provided consistent length, forcing earlier bullpen engagement even in wins.
Bullpen usage remained clean and effective — but already trending heavier than ideal for a 162-game season.
None of this surfaced as damage in April. But the stress pathways were visible.
🧩 Strategic Takeaway
March and April represented the best-case version of the 2025 Mets:
depth absorbing injuries,
offense doing enough,
bullpen still fresh,
outcomes aligned with expectations.
But it also quietly established the season’s central constraint: this team had limited tolerance for cumulative stress. When rotation length declined or run prevention cracked, there was no secondary system ready to compensate.
💬 Audience Prompt
Looking back now — did this start to feel sustainable at the time?
Or did it already feel like the team was operating close to its limits?
🔁 Transition to May
April built confidence. May would begin testing how much stress the system could actually absorb — and whether early warning signs were structural or survivable.
9 comments:
It felt sustainable IF Manaea and Montas returned more quickly….they didn’t…and if the staff did not then crumble early on, with the losses of Megill, Senga, and Canning. The latter two were freaky injuries. They were the straw that broke the camel’s back. The end of Soto’s slow start was expected to be a post-April adrenaline boost, and it was, but the pitching imploded.
But noting this here to some degree steps on your upcoming articles for May etc.
Sent to Steve, Tom Tango, Thomas Nestico, and Pitch Provider
Me?
I have lived my life one way since both my parents died when I was a kid... NEVER LOOK BACK AND DON'T LOOK TOO FAR FORWARD.
I hope all of you that enjoy revisiting the past reads and enjoys this series. It's gonna be a great one.
I will stay focused on the present, both as a Mets writer, but also in life in general.
My goal for this series beyond the retro to help us see how the things we observe watching the games actually translate to a logical set of metrics - given all the stats we discuss in this site & in general. The story will unfold as we look at each month.
If this work lands with our community, I would like to pace weekly & monthly in real-time as the 2026 season plays out. (I’m a geek this way). So I will collect input & feedback & lock down a repeatable process that will support the upcoming season. It should provide us more content to discuss, dissect & debate.
This is a very interesting tool to analyze incremental performance. Maybe the Mets should utilize it as well to make sure things don't get away from them before making adjustments.
(my guess is Steve is reading this post as I write this comment...)
Currently trying to turn on Steve in asking RVH to join them. Hell, if they can hire Martino, why not our boy?
I'm with you on that hire, Mack. Nobody better than RVH. As to the question of whether it felt sustainable. There is a famous theorem in confirmation theory to the effect that any (no matter how large) data set is compatible with a wide range of conclusions, including contradictory ones. For obvious reasons, it is called the underdeterminist thesis and is owed to a Duhem and Quine. And the March, April data is a perfect example. How one felt at the time is itself hard to recall honestly. I do know that how I felt was largely impacted by the success of the previous year. I was surprised by the result and optimistic. I thought two things ( coming from a world of decision theory ): first that it was surprising, given the injuries to starting pitchers and possibly sustainable if everybody returned healthy and performed as expected. I was also optimistic because we were successful having gotten so little from Soto at the time. Which brought me to the second response I had based on reversion to the mean. I thought Soto would revert to his mean (indeed he exceeded it) and so that increased my hope for sustainable success. On the other hand, I thought the team was flawed and would revert to the mean as well. I was guardedly optimistic. The pace was unsustainable; but the direction was in general sustainable. Put another way, It looked overall promising and provided no reason not to be optimistic about a playoff spot at the least.
Alas, optimism doesn't win games, but, heck as fans we can do very little if anything to impact the outcome of games, so we have to deal with the actual results when they come. Why not get the pleasure that optimism can bring until then?
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