20/20 Hindsight: National Lampoon’s Mets

The Mets went to Washington to face a bad Nationals team, and they cam out of the series looking like the bad team. They’re now not just bad, but also injured. Things are going south real fast:

1. The Mets absolutely did the right thing pulling Michael Conforto from that game. The team should be commended not just for pulling him but also for sending him to New York by train. It’s good to see they’ve learned something from how they mismanaged the Ryan Church and Jason Bay concussions.

2. It’s not his fault per se, but Robinson Cano cannot both be bad at the plate and in the field while also taking out the team’s best player.

3. With Conforto and Jeff McNeil having injuries, Cano needs to step up now. Same goes to Todd Frazier, who should begin to see some regular playing time, which should allow him to get into a groove. Not only do these two players need it to happen, Brodie Van Wagenen does as well.

4. Other than Edwin Diaz not one move Van Wagenen made this offseason has panned out,and it looks all the worse considering how much the team gave up in terms of prospects in an attempt to improve the team.

5. Drew Gagnon made Van Wagenen look bad when he out-pitched Wilmer Font who looked like a 29 year old reliever with a career 6.81 ERA trying to be a starting pitcher. Looking at Gagnon, you realize, not only was the trade unnecessary, but also giving up a prospect for a when you had a better version of him was plain dumb.

6. Gio Gonzalez continues to make the Mets look worse. In four starts, he is 2-0 with a 1.69 ERA and a 1.078 WHIP. In all four of his starts, he has gone at least five innings, which is something the Mets have only gotten twice from their fifth starts in their 10 starts. That includes Jason Vargas, who is averaging 3.2 innings per start.

7. As if Gonzalez performing well isn’t enough, and knowing the team passed on him thinking Vargas was better and Steven Matz was dealing with elbow issues, we now find out the team never actually made him an offer.

8. Van Wagenen did the same exact thing with his outfield. The Mets entered the year with just two starting caliber starting outfielders, and the team brought in Keon Broxton, who was a worse version of Juan Lagares. As a result, Broxton has seen almost no playing time.

9. It may not be a good look for Broxton to complain after his noncompetitive at-bat to end the game, but he does have a point. The team traded real assets to obtain him only to superglue him to the bench and not give him a real chance to establish himself.

10. Because of the Mets stubbornness not letting Dominic Smith play left field, the team is forced to play J.D. Davis in left field despite his not having the speed to play left field and his hitting .219/.219/.250 during the month.

11. It is going to be fun seeing Carlos Gomez wear a Mets uniform again. He was the big time prospect who was supposed to take us to the next level, except he didn’t because he was traded for Johan Santana. Then, he didn’t come back because he failed his medicals, which was fine by Mets fans as Wilmer Flores became a folk hero. Through all that has happened, it would be great to see Gomez be the key piece to a Mets winner like we thought he would be in 2007 and 2015.

12. The league has caught up to Pete Alonso. In May, Alonso is hitting just .191/.255/.383 while striking out 29.4 percent of the time. You wonder how long this goes on for before either Alonso adjusts or the Mets are forced to make a decision.

13. Even with Robert Gsellman struggles yesterday, the Mets bullpen has been great in May with the best ERA in the National League.

14. Too much is being made of Gsellman not pitching over eight days. This is a guy the Mets intend on leaning on heavily to pitch multiple innings, and anywhere you can get him a bit of extended rest you do it. It should also be noted between off days and the rain outs, the Mets haven’t played much over the past eight days.

15. So far, Tyler Bashlor has really stepped up and taken advantage of the opportunity given to him. With the way he is pitching, he may be an important piece to this bullpen.

16. Noah Syndergaard is finally looking like Syndergaard again with two of his last three outings being completely dominant.

17. Zack Wheeler‘s own run was broken up with a very disappointing effort against the Nationals. In that spot against that team, Wheeler needed to be better.

18. While we should expect more from Wheeler in that spot, it’s hard to get on Mets pitchers as a whole, as they are the reason the Mets are even close to .500. It’s also important to remember Wheeler is a second half pitcher, and as Syndergaard will tell you, the Mets are a second half team. The trick there is being close enough in the standings to take advantage of that.

19. Mickey Callaway‘s statement on catcher winning percentage was laughable, but then again what does he have to sell you to say Wilson Ramos has been good this year?

20. There are valid criticisms of Callaway like his dry humping Diaz and using Seth Lugo the day before Font was set to start. However, make no mistake, he’s only on the hot seat because none of Van Wagenen’s moves have worked. Ultimately, that makes Callaway the fall guy for a novice General Manager who has looked to be in over his head.

5 Replies to “20/20 Hindsight: National Lampoon’s Mets”

  1. David Klein says:

    Lol figured Alonso out not allowed to slump time to make a decision so hyperbolic

    1. Gothamist says:

      What Cano did yesterday just has me shocked!!!!

      We knew that Alonso had issues with these two, low average and huge Ks in Binghamton and his short stay in Vegas. Some wanted those up taking other’s ABATS last September.

      I was shocked that No One in the press picked up on that as #1 vs this year of service crap that was the only topic! TO RIZZO Alonso was NOT ready!
      Just because the other promotion (in July) worked beautifully just calling up Alonso in September was Not A good baseball move.

      I was surprised that he fixed them, the Ks and Average by March though he did work on his fielding to not just be ideal to being a DH at 26 years old.

      Where will lineup protection help the situation?
      Cano…?

      THIS WAS YOUR BEST POST I CAN REMEMBER. great prose to boot.

      Gsellman May be starting soon.
      Love your dry hump but that may be coming from upstairs.
      Remember about the Giradi firing, it was that the mgr, thing, mgr. in tune within a team making many these Diaz decisions.

      The GM will not do this Diaz deal and let Callaway just consult Eiland.

      Mets over a guy with abysmal port season stats $72m for catching.
      They ignored a great platoon bat in Suzuki and Sandy’s pursued Jonathon Lucroy was not on the radar.

      The Realmuto thing was never a possibility with so many bidders (how does Philly and Atlanta stock up so manynprospects so quickly w Atlanta having some extracted with international money deleted and still have elite prospects) .

      After Jeter dumped his outfield — Yelich deal — Realmuto was not coming over for anything but Amed plus..

      Too bad Dom Smith did not get his lefty arm starts in Syracuse, but a lefty in left?

      How this full season goes for Nimmo with or without lineup protection will be very telling.

      Again, great posts!

    2. metsdaddy says:

      The full quote was “You wonder how long this goes on for before either Alonso adjusts or the Mets are forced to make a decision.”

Comments are closed.