The long and taxing 162-game regular season schedule, which spans from late March to September, is invariably filled with ebbs and flows. The Mets have already experienced those ups and downs with more to come.
Expectations in sports are reasonably interlocked with a player’s salary and a team’s payroll. The Mets’ Juan Soto has the highest valued contract in baseball at $765 million for 15 years — he is in the second year of the deal — and the Mets are No. 2 behind the Los Angeles Dodgers (roughly $400 million including the luxury tax) in total payroll at $370 million.
The Mets’ performance on the field has not aligned with their monetary value so far this season. They are 21-27 and in last place in the National League East going into last night’s game versus the Nationals in Washington D.C. But there have been signs of life, breathed into them by rookies and other young players that could change the impression that this is another season that will end without a postseason appearance.
Last season, the Mets finished 83-79 and out of a playoff spot. They are currently 11 1/2 games behind the first-place Atlanta Braves and looking up at nine teams ahead of them in the wildcard race. It’s only the third week of May, but with so much ground to already make up, each day and each outing is consequential.
An uplifting three-game Subway Series against the Yankees this past weekend at CitiField showcased two Mets rookie outfielders: 23-year-old right fielder Carson Benge and 21-year-old center fielder A.J. Ewing. The Mets took two out of three from a Yankees team that has been reeling and dropping in the American League standings.
The athletic duo has infused energy and production into a lineup that has needed it. Free-agent signee Bo Bichette, the third baseman brought in partly to fill the power void left by Pete Alonso’s departure to the Baltimore Orioles, is still trying to find his groove at the plate, hitting just .224 with five home runs and 25 RBIs as of last night.
All-Star second baseman Francisco Lindor has been out of the lineup for one month (since April 23) with a strained left calf. Soto missed 15 games last month with a right calf strain. Excuses are monuments of nothingness, but it’s also true that the Mets legitimately have not been whole.
The Mets were 6-2 over their last eight games prior to last night. A win over the Nationals tonight and being on the plus side of a weekend series in Miami beginning tomorrow versus the Marlins would further change the perception of their long-term prospects.
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