Reese Kaplan -- When a Player Lasts Too Long Without Stepping Up

Every team has a history of making mistakes with young ballplayers.  Sometimes it is a matter of giving up on them too soon.  This scenario often results in a player who didn’t hit the ground running after making the attempt to become a major league regular.  We’ve all see teams jettison these slow bloomers and sometimes much to their future chagrin.

The opposite situation is the guy who has been given chance after chance based upon either minor league pedigree or a hot period of several months in the majors who then can never seem to replicate that early star promise.  Here the question becomes how long do you keep waiting for the magical resurgence that apparently is simply not destined to happen?

In the former situation you saw the Mets trade away some players who did not exactly set the world on fire during their trials in the big leagues.  Brandon Sproat from the pitching side and Luisangel Acuna from the offensive side would seem to fit into this categorization.  Is it possible they get it together and turn themselves into solid major leaguers?  Obviously, yes it is a way of making David Stearns look bad for giving up too soon on would be solid ballplayers.

On the flip side we’ve seen a multitude of times when the waiting for stardom after early flashes never seems to happen.  The poster child for this category is, of course, Mark Vientos.  After his 2024 out-of-nowhere absolutely torrid hitting performance people had him penciled in as a middle of the order type of hitter who was going to be a bargain priced homegrown player for years to come.  Unfortunately then 2025 arrived and although the home run power was evident the batting average dropped significantly while the defensive challenges became much harder to swallow without the 500 AB 30 HR power able to camouflage it.

Right now to hear many Mets fans and some media types tell it, the Mets simply need to cut him loose with a DFA since he is out of minor league options and his planned available on-the-field opportunities have been usurped by others.  Given the theoretical new orientation to defense it adds fuel to the fire for his expulsion since DH is the only place to put him if he was indeed hitting well and would hide his inability to hurt the team with his glove.

Unfortunately, there could be some validity to this viewpoint given Vientos’ struggles in Florida before departing for the WBC where his inability to get on base regularly once again has surfaced in a frustrating and visible manner.  However, bear in mind that February and March performance metrics don’t always mean anything.  Have you noticed that last year’s .317 hitter Bo Bichette has taken a 100 point dip in batting average?  Or how Marcus Semien hasn’t yet shown offensive productivity at all?

Some advocates of potential and doubters of some of the 2026 roster moves suggest that giving up so soon on someone with game changing power while still in his mid 20s and earning close to major league minimum would be a perhaps hasty transaction to make.  This position also has a bit of good thinking to it, but it puts an awful lot of faith on the turnaround everyone has given up expecting may or may not ever happen.

The potentially most sensible approach for folks to take is an 11th hour trade to bring someone of value back in exchange for Vientos.  Right now you’d be dealing from weakness and roster crunch which would mitigate the ranking of whomever you could get in exchange for him.  The risk here, of course, is that it puts even more pressure on Jorge Polanco, Brett Baty and (if he makes the team) Carson Benge to deliver results that meet or exceed expectations.  Still, getting anything in return for Vientos would be superior to a DFA and getting nothing at all.