The New York Mets’ three-game sweep of the St. Louis Cardinals will now have to wait three months due to the postponement of Wednesday’s series finale in St. Louis. Less than a week from the trade deadline, what kind of team will New York be then?
One of the subtexts of the queries we got this week for our most recent mailbag was that. Tomorrow, we will have the second section.
After more than one year of high power output, low batting average, are the Mets growing concerned that Pete Alonso is not going to age well? — Scott K.
Willard Sammon There were always some of those worries in the sector. Alonso has dropped since the beginning of the previous season, a total of 813 plate appearances.216/.314/.492. One veteran National League scout from a rival team informed me at the end of the last campaign that he would need to “either do more damage or start walking more.” He is not on a really good trend. Though it is still early, Alonso has actually done less of those two things in 2024 thus far. I would assume that, in a vacuum, Mets officials share everyone else’s reservations about Alonso. But because of his past with the Mets, he is also more valuable to them than to any other team. In the previous year or so, Alonso has
Tim Britton: Alonso’s tendency toward authoritarian contact intrigues me, to put it mildly. It also bothers me. Many people assume that chasing too much is the answer when a player struggles, but Alonso chased less last season than ever before, and he is been doing a terrific job of keeping in the zone this year.
But the damage in the zone hasn’t been the same.
Still, Alonso is the guy who barrels the ball the most, and when he does, it travels a great distance. But generally speaking, he is not hitting the ball as hard as he once did, and this has been a pattern for some years.
The weighted on-base average (wOBA) and projected slugging are drops based on a month; if it were not for the longer trend on contact itself, I would not be as concerned about them. It goes without saying that, although though Alonso takes great satisfaction in his ability to hit home runs and his overall savvy base running, his value is mostly derived from his improved defense. The fact that Alonso is a 30-homer rather than a 45-homer is a significant difference.
I know it’s early (we haven’t even hit Memorial Day yet!) but the Mets look like a team that will hover around .500 for most of the spring/early summer. If they’re .500, will they buy? Sell? Hold? — Anonymous
TB: David Stearns has typically been a buyer before the trade deadline, as I stated prior to the season. Stearns rewarded the Milwaukee Brewers’ regular playoff contention with a modicum of aggression at the deadline.
The Mets’ expectations going into the season and their current form suggest that they will be a peripheral contender at the deadline, sitting somewhere around.500 and not too far from a postseason berth. When the current playoff system was implemented in 2022, teams with a.500 record on trade deadline day have typically been 3 3/4 games out of a postseason berth on average.
It is ideal ground for “threading the needle,” or as I like to refer to it, acting as a “tailor” when the deadline approaches. Dealing with reliable contributors who are approaching the end of their contracts and attempting to replace them with younger, more reasonably priced talent is known as a tailoring approach. This season, that might mean dealing Luis Severino or Jose Quintana for the Mets. It might include relocating J.D. Martinez. Attempting to profit on a reliever’s spectacular season in exchange for a more reliable one could be the meaning behind it.
While admitting that trading Alonso would reduce their chances of re-signing him, the Mets should consider moving him if they are further out of it and have little to no chance of making the postseason this year.
Pete Alonso adds an insurance run in the 9th! #LGM pic.twitter.com/ul6a6msNJ6
— New York Mets (@Mets) May 8, 2024
WS: It might also depend on the type of team they are—a.500 squad. My sense is that they would endeavor to get better if there was an obvious necessity, for example, and the competition for the last wild card position appeared thin. That does not imply that they will not deal with a surplus if one arises in the future, even if they receive a potential in exchange. Just that in this case, context can important. The Mets’ current difficulty is that they are a.500 team, meaning it is difficult to predict where they will finish in the standings. Additionally, their issues, which include managing the running game, obtaining more production from their key players, and starting players needing to play deeper, are not easily resolved by trade.
I love Pete but I see him as traded before the deadline. Are there precedents for trade deadline deals where the player re-signs with the team trading the player away? — Anonymous
TB: It has occurred. In 2016, the New York Yankees re-signed Aroldis Chapman after trading him to the Chicago Cubs.
But I do recall covering the Boston Red Sox during their mid-season attempt to re-sign Jon Lester following his trade to the Oakland A’s. Lester ultimately signed a contract with the Cubs, but he questioned if he would have been less at ease leaving Boston if he had not spent two months pitching with the A’s in another league.
What’s the likely return for trading McNeil? — Lee B.
WS: This is fascinating: Luis Arraez just brought a great harvest of prospects to the Marlins, and it was not too long ago (2022, to be exact) that McNeil and Arraez were mentioned in the same sentence. But Arraez is five years younger than McNeil, who is thirty-two. Additionally, Arraez has maintained to bat above.300, in contrast to McNeil. McNeil is just above the league average at a time when it is roughly.240, and other metrics like as OPS+ indicate below-average output. Therefore, McNeil is not very valuable if he is not performing at his expected level, which is batting average.
Speculatively, the Mets might need to settle a sizable portion of their debt to McNeil in order to receive a respectable return on a potential deal, barring him from seeing some success again. McNeil has a club option for 2027 and is signed through 2026 at an average annual value of $12.5 million.
In the future, the Mets might have alternatives for replacements, but none of them are prepared. Ronny Mauricio is probably out for the season, Jett Williams (wrist) has missed the previous few weeks of action in Double A, and Luisangel Acuña has had offensive struggles in Triple A.
(Photo of Alonso: Jeff Curry / USA Today)
