The emotional (if not mathematical) second half of the season begins Friday night. At this point, all the pundits traditionally reassess their preseason prognostications and, undaunted by their failings, soldier on with even more pontifications. At KinersKorner.com, we see no reason to break from tradition, so herewith are our look-backs on how we did and how we think the NL East and our Metropolitans will fare between now and the Fall. Please destroy after reading. We’d hate to have people compare our batting average to, say, Tomas Nido’s before he was DFA’d.
A.J. Carter: Looking back on the first half of the season—I hate to say, “I told you so,” but….I told you so. I told you that the Braves would be at the top of the division, although I didn’t think it would be by this much. I noted that the Phillies – despite their flaws and issues so far – were a team to be reckoned with, and right now, I am pretty sure they will finish ahead of the Mets. And if you remember, I said the 2023 Marlins had a good chance of becoming this year’s version of the 2022 Orioles, and that still might be the case, although I admit I didn’t see the Reds coming along so quickly and challenging the Marlins for that distinction.
As for our hometown team, again I regret to say that my concerns about the aging roster have proved to be warranted, especially when it comes to injuries. Jose Quintana still hasn’t thrown a major league inning, and I don’t believe for one second that his most recent unimpressive rehab start was the result of “flu-like” symptoms. Justin Verlander may – or may not – be hitting his stride after his long stint on the IL. Carlos Carrasco’s recent effectiveness may be fool’s gold – he, too, is only one bad stride on the mound from another trip to the IL (if history holds true). And Max Scherzer’s recent ineffectiveness has placed the team in a sticky – or lack of sticky – situation. The only bright note has been Kodai Senga, who has adapted to the MLB strike zone and now seems capable of pitching enough innings to reduce the stress on the bullpen. The biggest failure of the pitching staff has been the starters’ inability to make it through five innings, let alone six or seven. Take a look at the numbers when they do. I’m not sure if the bullpen woes are due to the players’ abilities or the demands placed on them; I lean toward the latter.
Turning to the position players, I think Starling Marte is still recovering from his offseason double hernia surgery. Who knows what ails Jeff McNeil? But I don’t place a lot of blame on the lineup, even though they still lack a credible right-handed DH. Look at how many games the team has lost after scoring six or more runs. Inexcusable.
Can they turn it around? Maybe yes, maybe no. I’d stand pat at the trade deadline because I don’t think they are good enough so that one reasonably-obtainable player will make a difference or bad enough to conduct a fire sale. So enjoy the rest of the season, and to quote Mel Brooks’ theme to The Twelve Chairs: “Hope for the best, expect the worst. Some drink champagne, some die of thirst. No way of knowing which way it’s going. Hope for the best, expect the worst!”
Mark Rosenman: Opinions are like..well you know the rest. Every year the experts, fans, writers make their picks, which are nothing more than educated guesses. Then the season gets to the all-star break and we revisit those picks, and in the words of the Boss..Springsteen not Steinbrenner.. “Someday we’ll look back on this and it will all seem funny.” I picked the Mets for first, the Phillies for second and the Braves for third. Haven’t picked five numbers correctly in Lotto this year either ! But as I have said you cannot binge watch baseball. There is no fast forward button to get to game 162. It’s a grind. Teams look amazing the first half of the season – sometimes they are the real deal, others fade such as the Pirates, or come back down to earth like the Rays. Let’s be honest, if anyone truly knew what 162 games will bring, do you think every single commercial during a baseball game would be for some gambling site ??
That being said, let's look at the Mets’ season. I underestimated the loss of Edwin Diaz: I used all types of analytics to show that David Robertson would be just fine, and that has held true. However in Diaz’s absence everyone moved up a notch in the bullpen pecking order and it’s been a mess. Additionally, Diaz gave the Mets a sense of bravado and swagger. From the outside the Mets seem like a fragile team that if something does not go their way, it snowballs. I did not see that last season.
There is an old baseball adage that goes “You are what the back of your baseball card says you are – unless you are a member of the 2023 New York Mets: Over 295 major league games, Carlos Carrasco has a lifetime 3.92 ERA. Currently it is 5.16. Max Scherzer, over 446 major league games, has a lifetime ERA of 3.15; this season he sits at 4.31, Justin Verlander fashioned a 3.25 ERA over 494 career games. Just last season he pitched to a 1.75 ERA. This season, 3.60. That's just the pitching. It continues position by position. Who had Daniel Vogelbach having a higher batting average than Pete Alonso at the break ? Raise your hand if you had Tommy Pham having a higher batting average and more RBIs than last year;s NL batting champ, Jeff McNeil?
All that being said, the Mets find themselves seven games out of a playoff spot with 72 games to play. 92 seems like it could get a wild card spot. Can the Mets go 50-22 the remainder of the way ? If all of the players move closer to the back of their cards over the course of their careers, yes, if they all continue to have down years the answer is no.. so its either YA GOTTA BELIEVE or YA GOTTA BEREAVE.. I choose the former !
Russ Cohen: I thought the Mets had a chance to be a playoff team. I knew the Braves were the class of the NL East so I was hoping for a Wild Card berth. I knew they had old starters and I also knew the bullpen wasn’t great especially after Edwin Diaz went down.
Buck seems to have less control over the lineup than the analytics group. The Mets have played guys like Daniel Vogelbach way too much. They didn’t give Mark Vientos a real chance and never called up Ronny Mauricio? None of it made any sense.
The only trades Billy Eppler has made were trades where the Mets took on a bad contract. Anybody can do that. The Mets’ reliance on older Yankees and Orioles grew tiresome. Fun fact: Dylan Bundy, had an ERA over 10! He was supposed to be starting pitching depth. Seth Lugo should have been retained. He loved the team and just wanted to be a starter. Well, the Mets could use him and his 3.39 ERA. Why didn’t they sign Michael Conforto to a two-year deal?
They don’t have the assets or want to try and trade for Shoehei Ohtani so try and get Dylan Cease. I would give up a good prospect for him because he has three years of control and could be their ace. The Mets have no ace, just a collection of starters and Kodai Senga is their best. That’s not how they drew it up but here we are.
The Mets’ chance of making the playoffs are super slim.
John Coppinger: I don’t remember what I had for breakfast yesterday, so I’m not going to pretend to remember what I wrote at the start of the season beyond the fact that I overestimated the Mets (which a lot of people did), I underestimated the Braves (which in retrospect was stupid), and I said that Buck Showalter was going to give the starting pitchers as many days off as possible even if he went to a six man rotation. (I was right on that, but the context of that situation was mangled beyond recognition.)
In hindsight, even looking at how this season unfolded, I wouldn’t have done a thing differently. They spent a ton of money. It didn’t work. As Mark said, there was regression from multiple players among all swaths of acquisition. Players they got this winter (Verlander), players they got last winter (Scherzer, Marte, Canha), players they got in trade (Carrasco), and players that were reared in the system (Alonso, McNeil.) . No team can survive that whether they spend Steve Cohen Money or John Fisher money.
The alternative was, as some have said, to “be patient and play the kids.” That’s code for tanking, and it would have been a disaster (especially considering that there were no kid pitchers in the system close to ready.) What Cohen’s money is doing is making sure the kids can develop at their own pace. Scream all you want about Mark Vientos (and yes, he should have played more against righties instead of being pigeon holed as a “lefty masher”), but the approach has worked great with Francisco Alvarez and Brett Baty, and I’d bet Steve’s money that it will work with Ronny Mauricio too if he can find a position he likes.
But the focus should be on the future, because the big question that the Mets have to answer in the second half is: “Should the Mets be buyers or sellers?” The answer is “yes.” If there are trades that make sense where players with expiring contracts can bring back decent prospects (Pham), do it. But if there are trades where taking on cash can get the Mets some pitching to help in 2024, do that too. Trevor Gott was a great example of this. They took on Chris Flexen’s contract and cut him so fast you’d have thought he was going to sign with the Lakers to play with LeBron in the playoffs. But they got relief help out of it. If there are trades like that available with teams that want to shed salary for next season (think German Marquez in Colorado, Jordan Lyles in Kansas City, Liam Hendriks in Chicago … in that vein), and you can eat salary and minimize the prospect level you send back, then do that too. Then you can get players to help in ‘24 but then you can still lose a ton of money after that season to make a run at a certain free agent outfielder that will be a free agent then. (Cough, Juan Soto, cough.)
Want to give us your opinion ..here is your chance to Grade the Mets.
コメント