The New York Mets are clearly within arm’s reach of a World Series title, and many fans are patiently awaiting news of a major offensive transaction that they believe is necessary to bring a championship back to Queens for the first time in 30 years.
The Mets 2015 season did not begin to turn around until the team acquired Yoenis Cespedes from the Detroit Tigers and Juan Uribe and Kelly Johnson from the Atlanta Braves.
Prior to acquiring Cespedes the Mets were quite literally the worst offensive team in the league, averaging just 3.5 runs per game and hitting .234 as a team.
After the Mets traded for Cespedes on July 31st, they almost immediately transformed into the best offensive team in the National League, hitting .275 and averaging 6.5 runs per game.
Now one certainly does not need to be a sabermetrics expert to conclude that the only thing the Mets’ lineup had been missing during the first half of the 2015 season was an offensive punch. The pitching was there, as was the defense. As soon as the Mets added some power to their lineup, all of the pieces began to fall into place.
So far this offseason the Mets have watched Cespedes and NLCS hero Daniel Murphy walk out the door along with their combined 49 home runs and 178 RBIs (although only half of that production from Cespedes came after he was traded to the Mets midseason).
The biggest transactions the Mets have made to date have been trading Jonathon Niese to the Pittsburgh Pirates for second basemen Neil Walker and signing free agent shortstop Asdrubal Cabrera to a two-year contract.
While Walker and Cabrera should improve the Mets’ defense up the middle, these players bring with them a combined 31 home runs and 129 RBIs from last season.
That essentially means that losing Murphy and Cespedes while bringing in only Walker and Cabrera will result in around 30 percent less offensive production.
Clearly New York has some ground to make up in the middle of their lineup if they are to mount another run at a World Series title in 2016.
But the problem with the Mets right now is that they are in no position to shell out huge money for a big-time free agent when they have far too many internal questions that need to be answered.
First and foremost, the Mets don’t really know what they have offensively heading into the 2016 season.
David Wright missed nearly the entire 2015 season due to a back injury, and Michael Conforto has played only 56 regular season games in the big leagues.
If Wright remains healthy and Conforto develops into a major offensive threat while becoming the Mets’ everyday left fielder, then these two players, combined with Walker and Cabrera, could make up for the offensive production the team will lose in Cespedes and Murphy.
Travis d’Arnaud has been plagued by a number of injuries throughout his young career and played just 67 games for the Mets last season. But the 26-year-old catcher has also shown the potential to develop into a stronger offensive threat. If d’Arnaud can manage to remain healthy for most of the 2016 season, he could add some additional offensive power that the team lacked at the catcher position for most of 2015.
The Mets would like to resolve these issues before shelling out a boatload of money for a big-bat free agent that they may not even need right now.
Of course free agency is not the only way to acquire another middle-of-the-lineup bat. The Mets could also make a trade that will bring a Cespedes–caliber player to New York for the start of the 2016 season. But they are also in no position to pull off a major trade right now due to the value of some of their key trading options.
If the Mets were to pull off a deal for a big-time bat, the trade would almost certainly involve at least one of the following three players: Conforto, Zack Wheeler or Matt Harvey.
Conforto is a hot young prospect that would be attractive to any team in the trade market. But if he continues to develop in a manner that most expect him to, he will have not even reached a fraction of the value the Mets could extract from him six months to one year down the line.
Harvey also has to be considered a trade option for the Mets. The right-hander begins arbitration this season and will be an unrestricted free agent in 2018. If this year’s market for strong starting pitching is anything to go by, Harvey will be looking at a massive payday during the 2018 offseason.
So the Mets can either maximize Harvey’s value in a trade sooner rather than later, or they can watch him head out of town in the free-agency market without getting anything in return.
The problem with Harvey is that he, too, has not yet reached his maximum trade value. He is coming off of his first year following Tommy John surgery, and any prospective taker would likely want to evaluate how Harvey emerges in 2016 after throwing the most pitches ever recorded by a player in the year immediately following such surgery.
If Harvey starts strong in 2016, he will likely hit his maximum trade value by the middle of the season, which is when the Mets may be able to utilize him to acquire a big bat.
Wheeler is another trade option for the Mets, but his value is almost nonexistent right now, as he has not yet returned from the Tommy John surgery that had him sidelined for the entire 2015 season. If Wheeler comes back strong in 2016, his trade value could increase dramatically.
Wheeler is also a player that could be expendable for the Mets if the team decides to hold onto Harvey. But the other side of that coin is that the Mets will not really know if they can afford to trade Harvey until they have had sufficient time to evaluate Wheeler’s return from Tommy John.
So the Mets certainly have the ability to acquire the offensive power they need through either a trade or free agency. But signing an expensive free agent to a long-term deal before knowing if he is truly needed— or unloading young players in trades before they have reached their maximum trade value—is not the right way to go about building a team that can be a World Series contender in coming years.
The Mets have been treading lightly this offseason, which may not be exactly what the New York fans were hoping for.
But many questions must be addressed before the Mets can intelligently proceed toward acquiring the bats they need.
And much to the chagrin of Mets fans, these questions will more than likely not be answered until at least the middle of the 2016 season.
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