Kallet: Assuming Offseason Is Complete, Mets Are Not A Playoff Team
By Brad Kallet, WFAN.com
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Don't look now, but pitchers and catchers will report to spring training in about a month.
Pardon my bleak outlook, but I don't see any more moves coming from Mets general manager Sandy Alderson. I mean, do you?
Virtually all the impact free agents are off the market, the front office doesn't want to part with its top pitching prospects and … oh yeah … ownership apparently has no interest in spending money to improve the club.
Michael Cuddyer, the prized free-agent addition of the offseason, was signed in early November. After that early strike, Mets fans were treated to a bench player in John Mayberry Jr. and a couple of thrilling minor league deals for relief pitchers.
Dillon Gee will likely be traded shortly, but it's doubtful that he'll net much in return.
As unfathomable as it might seem, Alderson did not upgrade at shortstop, though I can't blame him for not trading Noah Syndergaard for one year of Ian Desmond.
So barring anything unforeseen, this is your team. Your 2015 New York Mets are all but a finished product as the season slowly creeps up on us.
Stoked, right?!
Yeah, me neither.
Sure, I like the confidence from Matt Harvey, Jacob deGrom, David Wright and Terry Collins. They're all talking playoffs, which is certainly refreshing. But I'm far from sold.
The Mets should improve on their 79-win total from last year. Cuddyer makes the lineup stronger, Wright and Curtis Granderson should have better years and up-and-coming players like Lucas Duda, Travis d'Arnaud and Juan Lagares should continue to come into their own.
The bullpen looks solid and the pitching staff, again, should be brilliant. It will only get better with the return of Harvey and the likely promotion of top prospect Syndergaard.
So yes, this team should be better than it was last season. But it will still fall short.
New York only mildly improved, while other clubs in the National League got significantly better. With Alderson playing it safe and taking a conservative approach -- again, the Wilpons deserve more blame than the GM -- the Padres, Brewers, Cubs and Marlins all appear to be more dangerous than the Amazin's. Not to mention the Giants, Pirates, Dodgers, Cardinals and Nationals.
The Mets will likely be battling the former four teams for wild-card berths, and I don't like their chances.
You can forget about the division. The Nationals, who were head and shoulders better than the Mets even before they landed ace Max Scherzer, are a lock to win the NL East. The Mets will have to figure out a way to beat this team if they have any chance of contending.
New York went 4-15 against the Nats and 75-68 against the rest of the league in 2014. And now Washington's starting rotation has a chance to be all-time great.
What will help the Mets is the fact that the Phillies and Braves are trending downward. With Atlanta basically throwing in the towel, both NL East rivals look terrible on paper. New York will have to take full advantage of these two teams in their 38 meetings against them.
If the season unfolds as it typically does, the Mets will need to win around 88 games to secure the second wild-card berth in the National League. It might even take 90 victories.
I expect this team to win 82-85 games, finally ending its six-year drought of sub-.500 seasons. But to expect the Mets to win nine more games than last year, after only adding Cuddyer and a now-healthy Harvey, is rather unrealistic.
Heck, the Mets aren't even the second-best team in their division. The Marlins, amazingly, have surpassed them following a highly productive winter. Third-place clubs don't often see mid-October baseball.
The framework is there. The Mets have plenty of talent, but they're at least a hitter away. If Alderson had acquired one big bat, in addition to Cuddyer, I would have been confident that this team could seriously make a run at it. But they simply won't hit enough, and that will end up costing them.
The Mets are continuing to get better, but this rebuilding process is just taking way too long.
Don't get your hopes up, Mets fans. Not that your hopes are up, anyway. I'm willing to bet that you're just as frustrated as I am.
The Mets will miss the playoffs for the ninth consecutive time. Count on it.
Brad Kallet is an editor and columnist for CBSNewYork.com. He has written for TENNIS.com, MLB.com and SMASH Magazine, among others. You can follow him on Twitter @brad_kallet.
