Teams on the Rise Trilogy - Part 3: New York Mets (MLB)

I am officially granting my fellow Mets fans permission to take the paper bags off of their heads. Kind of brings you back to the Piazza days, right? Get used to it, because things are changing. Queens is ready for the return of the Amazin’s, and they won’t have to wait for long.

The Mets have ditched the “sign every big name you can get for way too much money” approach that almost worked for them in the past decade with guys like Louis Castillo, Mo Vaughn, Carlos Delgado, Carlos Beltran (if you have a problem with this mention, watch the end of game 7 of the 2006 NLCS and the Septembers of 2007 and 2008), Jason Bay--tell me when to stop. Now, they have developed very solid players that can serve as a foundation for this team for the next decade, and who are certainly something to be excited about.

The foundation lies in pitching.

Matt Harvey pitched like a Cy Young caliber guy for most of the 2013 season--his second year in the bigs. In fact, his 2.27 ERA earned him fourth in votes for the award despite an early exit in August with an elbow injury that led to Tommy John surgery. The injury was devastating, but pitchers have proven to be able to rebound from the surgery (see Tommy John himself, who pitched another 14 successful seasons after receiving the surgery). At a young age, Matt Harvey is a perfect candidate for a successful return. Fortunately for the Mets, this success will now come at a lower price.

There were discussions of Harvey approaching $200 million territory if he could maintain his success for a tiny bit longer before he got hurt. If this were the case, owner Fred Wilpon--who has experienced serious debt since the recession--would probably not be willing to keep Harvey long-term. Harvey will have to settle for less money, of course, and it is very possible that he could be in Queens for the majority of a long career. As a 25 year old guy with remarkable talent, that is great news for the Mets.

The rest of the Mets’ rotation is equally promising. Zack Wheeler is a 23 year old stud who earned an impressive 3.42 ERA in his rookie campaign. He has a diversity of pitches which include a four-seam and two-seam fastball that averages out in the mid-90s. He has the making of a future ace, and is going to be very willing to sign an extension with the Mets if offered one during the 2014 season. If the Mets can lock him down, I see the Harvey-Wheeler combination as the best 1-2 punch in baseball for a good portion of the next decade.

To add on to that, 27 year old Jon Niese has established himself with ERA’s of 3.40 in 2012, 3.71 in 2013, and 1.82 this year. The Mets have him under a strong contract that pays him approximately $5 million a year and gives them the option of keeping him under that contract until 2018.

Dillon Gee is another 27 year old guy who is coming off his strongest season last year, where he earned a 3.62 ERA and a winning record with around 200 innings pitched. He has started this season off strong as well, and will not be such a costly guy to keep around. For a guy who can be fourth or even fifth in the rotation, he is actually pretty impressive.

With four really promising guys who can go another 10 years at least, we look to the farm system and find another two very intriguing options in Noah Syndergaard and Rafael Montero (numbers 1 and 3 on the Mets’ Top 20 Prospects List of 2014). Get one of those two to be a franchise guy, and the Mets’ rotation could be one of the top rotations in baseball in the upcoming years.

You need to score runs too--something the Mets have been struggling to do in the last few seasons. They’ve ranked 23rd and 25th in runs in last two years, so why believe that anything is going to change?

We have to start with the captain. David Wright is everything, with a career average surpassing .300 and no signs of slowing down. The veteran will be in Queens through 2020, after signing the largest contract in Mets’ history (8 years/approx. $138 million). He’s not a concern, and neither--I argue--is one other member of New York’s infield.

Daniel Murphy hits the ball harder than anyone. He has an incredible knack of hitting line drives, and with a solid glove as well, he’s a guy that joins Wright as the core position players in New York’s present and future. He’s getting better every year, and is currently hitting .320 this season. A career .292 hitter, that number is going to continue to climb for years to come. The Mets have to ensure that those numbers climb while he’s in Queens. He is underpaid at $5.7 million this season after signing a one-year deal in January, and will be eligible for arbitration in the offseason. The Mets have to sign him long-term, and with back-to-back seasons of new contracts for Murph, I am confident that both sides want that to happen.

Curtis Granderson, Eric Young Jr., and Chris Young are not long-term options for the Mets. 28-year-old Lucas Duda, 27-year-old Eric Campbell, 25-year-old Juan Lagares, 25-year-old Travis d’Arnaud, and 24-year-old Ruben Tejada are. Duda is a hard hitter, but with a career-high of 15 HR’s in a season, his mid-.200 batting average isn’t going to cut it. If he can find his power, he can be a solid hitter 5th in the line-up. Eric Campbell and Lagares are new to the big leagues, but with averages thus far of .455 and .304, expectations are rightfully high. Travis d’Arnaud is inexperienced, and is batting like it, but with outstanding minor league numbers, this player who was named number 6 on MLB’s Top 100 Prospects list last year may be a solid option for New York. Finally, Ruben Tejada is a tough case. He has sparks of brilliance, but also has a long record of weak play. He’s young, and only time will tell how he develops. I can’t offer much more than that.

I can spew out names that are coming up in the farm system for New York--Dominic Smith, Wilmer Flores, Amed Rosario--but there is no way to predict future success. I will say that the Mets’ farm system is ranked to be one of the top of all organizations. With incredible pitching, the Mets are going to need a couple of guys to come out in the next few years that can help out Murphy and Wright. They need to stop wasting money on old, high-profile guys like Curtis Granderson. They have the pitching, they need to get a couple of solid, young outfielders to make their line-up respectable. And if they can improve their line-up like I expect, I think the Mets are going to be a force in the NL for years to come.

Sandy Alderson: The Man With the Plan

 

Omar Minaya, the deposed GM of the New York Mets, once said towards the end of his tenure that New York's "not a market where you can go young. You have to bring in players." Meaning- you can't rebuild in New York. Just can't happen. Fans won't accept it, ownership wouldn't allow it. So the Mets fired Minaya at the end of the year and started rebuilding.

To steer their rebuilding effort, the Mets brought in Sandy Alderson. Sandy Alderson is very different from the last GM of the Mets. Alderson is very erudite, and when you hear him speak, he reminds you very much of the Harvard lawyer that he is. Alderson always seems like he's the smartest person in the room. Nothing seems to stick to Alderson, a good trait to have in the New York market. 

Alderson is an icon of Money Ball (ironically barely mentioned in the move adaptation) and analytics. Sandy Alderson is not the Met's answer to the appropriately named Brian Cashman, he's the Met's Billy Beane or Andrew Friedman. He's has been stockpiling years of cost controllability, and only spending on short term deals (minus the Wright extension). Sound familiar? 

The New York Mets are rebuilding like a small market team. They haven't taken on salary since 2009, and have a lot of money coming off the books this year. Jason Bay, Johan Santana, Jose Reyes, Carlos Beltran, and Francisco Rodriguez have all shipped off. The Mets 2010 opening day payroll was over $132 Million. Last season it was under $90 million, and the Mets 2014 payroll obligations for next year are a mere (roughly) $56 million. This an Oakland or Tampa Bay payroll, not the payroll of the biggest market in the US. The Phillies, who finished behind the Mets in the standings, already owe over $120 million for 2014. 

But since the start of the Alderson Era, 2014 was sold as a fulcrum point for the Mets. The 2014 Mets was suppose to be the most talented Mets team since 2008. This was the year money comes off the books, young talent starts producing while free agents are brought to Queens. But now rumors are swirling that Alderson has payroll constraints. The Wilpons are supposedly suffering sticker shock. They're surprised by free agent prices, and it seems a little too convenient. The Mets need to spend to appease their fan base, while Alderson is averse to large contracts. It's clear Jacoby Ellsbury and Robison Cano aren't arriving in Flushing any time soon. So the only way to avoid an uprising in Queens is to win. Soon. 

Future Met Noah Syndergaard

The Mets 2014 rotation was supposed to future and already aces  Zack Wheeler and Matt Harvey. Now with Harvey on the shelf, the pitching depth of the Mets will be tested. Jon Niese and Dillon Gee are already effective starters, but Neise has always underperformed his peripheral numbers. Jenrry Mejia, a once-former-prospect, has now regained promise with a string of good starts.

In double AA is 6 foot 6 Noah Syndergaard, who profiles as an ace at the major league level. Rafael Montero is also in Alderson's farm system, and while he might not be a future ace he could be a solid innings eater (or the next Greg Maddux, you never know). Notably, both prospects were the starters in the futures game, which fittingly took place at Citi Field, home of the Mets. And the next day, Matt Harvey started the All-Star game. 

It's not like there's no hope for the Mets. The All-Star game was an embodiment of that. Alderson has done as good a job as can be expected rebuilding the farm system through trades. It's just going to take awhile (small market, remember?). The Boston Red Sox going from 69 wins to World Series champs is probably the worst thing that could happen for the Mets front office. Since Alderson took over, it was clear handing out huge contracts would not be a regular occurrence. But the Red Sox were able to reload in a season, hand out responsible free agent deals, and improve by 28 wins.

Now there are expectations, however unreasonable, of the Mets to do something similar. But just because the Red Sox didn't hand out one large contract doesn't mean they didn't spend money. They handed out multiple multi year offers - including Victorino, Napoli, and Dempster- and essentially acquired half of their lineup via free agency, not to mention resigning Pedroia and Ortiz to big money. The Mets don't have money to burn anymore. 

So it's up to Alderson to get creative and try to build a contender. There are several free agents that could be fits for the Mets, and likely had at low enough cost. Chris Young was a start. Short stop Stephen Drew would be a good fit. The Mets still need another outfielder. Trades need to go down. This will be the offseason to see if Alderson really is the right man for the job. He won't have any shortage of work.