Reese Kaplan -- If at First You Don't Succeed...

When people try to analyze what went wrong with the 2026 Mets season there are a plethora of reasons ranging from slumps to injuries to front office inertia.  Every one of them represents a percentage of explanation but not justification for things that went wrong.  If we started dissecting them we could be here for hours and hours.  Instead, let’s just focus our attention on one thing.

When the news filtered out that free agent Pete Alonso had chosen to sign a deal with the Baltimore Orioles it hit everyone in the Mets universe like the proverbial slap in the face.  It was harsh, unexpected and immediately raised questions about how and why it had happened.  Some folks felt it was simply player greed which led to cashing in on a once-in-a-career windfall of money.  Others said it was a rift between the team and the player.  Others just scratched their heads and wondered what the club would do to fix this enormous departure.

What no one really saw in the planning was the future sight of Jorge Polanco joining the team as he was known as an injury prone middle infielder who had come back in 2025 with one of his better seasons.  He’d played 963 games in the majors up to that point in his career at shortstop, second base, third base and DH.  Buried deep in the stat sheet he’d also logged a whopping 3 games at first base.  David Stearns felt that he was an under the radar choice to take over Pete Alonso’s former position on the field and he was given $40 million of Steve Cohen’s money to play two years wearing blue and orange. 

I won’t dwell on how this odd decision panned out.  Suffice to say it has not been good.  Alonso is batting .249 with 18 HRs and 52 RBIs less than halfway through the season.  He’s on the path for usual production.  Given injuries, Polanco has hit .179 with 1 HR and 2 RBIs spread over only 56 ABs.  One of these things is not like the other.

Going forward the question arises what will the Mets do at first base?  There are several possible approaches including maintaining the status quo and banking heavily on Polanco healing while taking over the first base responsibilities for which he was cryptically signed.  That could theoretically work if he remains on the field, but at this point it would not fill fans nor media with a whole lot of confidence.

There is minor leaguer Ryan Clifford who most definitely has home run power.  He is currently sitting on a AAA total of 13 HRs and 36 RBIs.  While not Alonso numbers, it does show run production capability.  Unfortunately he’s doing it while hitting a point below the Mendoza line and has already whiffed 105 times in292 ABs.  He’s well on his way to a 200K season as a minor league all-or-nothing hitter.  Right now he doesn’t look like an answer.

Then there is the once shining Mark Vientos.  He’s played quite a lot at first base this season and you cannot hide his defensive shortcomings there any better than you could across the diamond at third.  His bat is erratic at best and frankly the fans are all wishing the Mets would give up on the long experiment that only proved a single solid season.  (Ditto to Brett Baty who didn’t even have that much productivity). 

Let us not forget the AAAA wonderscrub, Jared Young.  After getting hurt early in this season he’s come back to become the primary first baseman and while not embarrassing himself in the field nor at the plate, he’s already 30 years old and has never been a regular in the major league.  His average has dropped to .239 which is better than his career mark of .218, but with that lackluster contact hitting he has 4 HRs and 10 RBIs over 88 ABs.  If you extrapolated that over a full season it could potentially mean 24 HRs and 60 RBIs, not horrible but not starter-worthy stats. 

It would appear that a first base solution needs to come from outside the organization unless you are indeed fully committed to Polanco.  It could be via trade or it could be in free agency.  The trade candidates are a great unknown but the players available to the highest bidder would include Alec Bohm, Rhys Hoskins, Yandy Diaz (if he opts out), Josh Bell (if he opts out), Paul Goldschmidt, Carlos Santana and Miguel Andujar.  There are others but they are of the non-starter level of play.  It may indeed require a trade to happen.