Decisions, Decisions: Position Players

We complete our three-part series on the player decisions the Mets will face after the 2022 season, focusing on position players.

In parts one and two of this series, we looked at New York Mets starters and relievers that would be free agents following this season. Today we wrap up with a look at the position players. Unlike the pitching staff, where the Mets front office will be forced to make several important decisions, there is only one significant position player reaching free agency: CF Brandon Nimmo. But Nimmo is an important player, indeed. Brandon is one of the offensive catalysts for this club and, as a bonus, turned himself into an excellent center fielder.

Depth Isn't a Four-Letter Word

Although anything certainly can happen, we're probably not going to see a big flurry of moves in baseball over the next two weeks. The Mets have made some progress in signing depth pieces, while also adding Trevor May to the bullpen and inking James McCann to a four year deal. Getting Jared Porter into the fold as their new General Manager was important for this offseason and for the future. They still have a lot left on their to-do list, however. If they went into battle with the players already under contract, you'd probably be looking at a .500 baseball team, and that would be dependent on key players staying mostly healthy. Of course, we'd all bet the farm that major additions are still coming, and we would be pretty disappointed in 2021 if the Mets weren't at least strongly competitive for a playoff spot.

Getting the Little Things Right

Back about a month ago, I was writing about the Mets' search for a President of Baseball Operations that wasn't going very well. None of the names that Alderson and Cohen had prioritized were panning out. They couldn't get permission to speak with many of them, and the ones they did meet with cited family reasons for not wanting to uproot and come to New York City. It was amusing when a few items started popping up in the media, questioning whether the struggle to get candidates to even interview represented some sort of early failure for Cohen's regime. Talk about a hot take!

My Cup Runneth Over

I'm trying really hard to remember back a couple of days ago to what it felt like when the Mets were still trying to find a starting catcher and a GM. Try as I might, I just can't recapture that feeling. Not that the club's shopping list is all checked off by any means, but things have a right on schedule vibe to them now rather than a when the hell is something going to happen? feel. This contentment will last for precisely as long as it takes for word to leak out that the Mets are deep into things with Springer or Bauer, but I figure I might as well enjoy it as long as it lasts. Serenity is a transitory emotion.

Free Agents, Post-Coronavirus Baseball and the Weight of Expectations

Joel Sherman had an article in the New York Post yesterday about the Mets' reported pursuit of pitcher Jake Odorizzi. According to Sherman, the Mets seem to be viewing Odorizzi as more of a fallback, depending on how the free agent dominoes fall this winter.  Which makes sense. They're probably not going to sign Trevor Bauer and Odorizzi unless they strike out completely on position players and settle for cheaper options there. It might go the other way, too. They might lose out on both Bauer and Odorizzi and look elsewhere for starting pitching. You never know how the free agents will start to fall. Remember, in 2005 the Mets were never looked at as the frontrunners for Pedro Martinez or Carlos Beltran. Sure, Omar Minaya was aggressive, but some of it was beyond the Mets' control. If the Red Sox wanted to keep Pedro and the Yankees were more interested in Beltran, neither one of them would have wound up as Mets.

Baseball Executive Needed, Cojones Required

Hire me, Steve!

Another day, another disappointment for the Mets in their search to hire an executive. After lowering their sights to a GM working under Sandy Alderson rather than a President of Baseball Operations, the Mets are still looking to make a hire. Today's news is that former pitcher Chris Young doesn't want to uproot his family from Dallas to New York City. Some people are making a big deal of this, but I don't really care all that much. I don't blame the club for aiming high for a candidate, and I don't think they should settle for anyone they don't really want. At this point they should perhaps consider tabling the whole thing for another year and going forward with the people they already have. But that's up to Alderson and Cohen.

Rebooting the Mets

It was becoming fairly obvious for a while that the Mets weren't going to hire a President of Baseball Operations and a GM, signaled by the lack of interviews with any of the big names they were reportedly pursuing. The Mets made it official Monday when Sandy Alderson what it be known that they had changed course and were only looking for a GM. As it stands now, Sandy Alderson will do the job of president of baseball operations. The Mets will hire a GM to work underneath Alderson, with the goal that within a year or two this person would take over running the baseball operations.

Why Winning by Losing Wouldn't Be the Right Call

If you missed it, Saturday's post on this blog was a rebuttal to a Daniel Kaplan article on The Athletic site that took a pretty negative point of view on the team's future. Kaplan's angle was that the Mets would be unable to keep up with the Yankees in New York without deficit spending that would slowly bleed new owner Steve Cohen dry. The gist of Kaplan's view was that the Mets' revenues are significantly less than the Yankees and Citi Field was less ideally located than Yankee Stadium. I'm not going to rehash it all here, basically, I found his argument to be remarkably weak and superficial.

Seriously, Dude, It's Not the Ballpark

There was a piece today by Daniel Kaplan today in The Athletic about Steve Cohen's purchase of the Mets. My first instinct upon reading it was to dismiss it as a bit of contrariness and fluffery but, in thinking about it afterward, I thought it would serve as an excellent starting point for today's post. It was clear from the beginning of the piece that Kaplan was trying to pour some cold water on the mostly positive coverage — at least so far — of Cohen's takeover of the club.

Baseball's Uncertain Future, and How It Might Affect the Mets

There was a piece by Evan Drellich in The Athletic last week that caught my eye, but in all of the excitement surrounding Steve Cohen's final approval by MLB owners, I wasn't able to get around to writing about it. The current CBA (Collective Bargaining Agreement) between MLB and the Players Association is set to expire after the upcoming 2021 baseball season. It's been a long time since the last strike/lockout in 1994-1995, but those of us who lived through it still remember it vividly and dread the potential for a repeat of that event. The ugly negotiations that preceded this season were a red flag that a quarter of a century of avoiding those stoppages is very much in jeopardy this time around. And how cruel would that be to all baseball lovers, even more so to Mets fans like us who have waited so long for a regime change for our club?

My Favorite Billionaire

Steve Cohen's decision to engage with Mets fans on Twitter this weekend was, by all accounts, a smashing success. Fans were already quite giddy about the final hurdles being overcome on the sale of the Mets. Cohen's commitment to pumping some money into the club, along with some commitments already made to the team's employees, is a breath of fresh air to fans after the final penny-pinching years of the Wilpon regime. Cohen's decision to engage with the fans directly also provided a welcome contrast to what felt like the increasing aloofness of the Wilpons. While I don't expect to find Cohen on social media communicating with fans constantly, this weekend's interaction was a lot of fun. It also seems to me pretty smart, whether intentional or not, to solidify the fans' solid buy-in to the new regime.

Decisions, Decisions

The Mets made a qualifying offer to pitcher Marcus Stroman today. If he accepts, he gets $18.9 million to stay here for one more year. If he rejects the offer and signs elsewhere, the Mets get a draft pick. This is a no-brainer for the Mets, who retain Stroman for a year at a fairly reasonable price if he accepts their offer.