It’s really incomprehensible simply how horrible the New York Mets are. Certain, there are 4 groups with worse data in MLB this season — however no one in baseball comes near the disparity between expectation and actuality than the Mets.
It is a crew that’s massive, dumb, costly, ineffective, and laughed at by anybody who units eyes on it — defended solely by these with a mix of cult-like fanaticism and blind loyalty. The Mets are formally the Cybertruck {of professional} sports activities.
It wasn’t way back this crew was talked about as a possible contender. On paper the Mets had been a crew that might make a severe run on the pennant if its rotation improved. Nonetheless, Wednesday completely underscored simply how far behind the Mets are, shedding 10-3 in a blowout to the Dodgers, an inflection level on each the Mets’ futility, and a reminder of how far they’re from being elite.
Horrible on the sector, imploding off of it — it’s on the level the place gamers like Jorge Lopez seem content material to be fired over having to go well with up once more and play for “the worst crew in the entire f***ing MLB.”
It didn’t take lengthy for Lopez to get his want, because the Mets’ pitcher was designated for project on Thursday morning. One other footnote within the hilarity of this season in New York, the sporting equal of getting your finger crushed within the chrome steel trunk.
Unhealthy groups come and go, however what the Mets are doing is unprecedented. This is a corporation with the No. 1 payroll in all of baseball, paying its roster a staggering $307M this season — however they’re now 11 video games underneath .500 and are twenty sixth in MLB in win proportion.
There are presently 17 groups with a payroll of lower than $200M with higher data than the Mets. Six of whom are above .500 whereas spending lower than HALF what the Mets are blowing on their roster this season. It’s a lesson not simply in futility, however a few of the most impressively horrible roster constructing sports activities has ever seen.
Because it stands each participant on the Mets is so horrifically dangerous that solely two gamers ON THE ENTIRE ROSTER clear a WAR of 1.0. Needless to say a 2.0 WAR is usually accepted as a bog-standard MLB participant, whereas someplace within the 4-5 vary is the sort of All-Star participant the Mets thought they had been signing. The disparity between wage and efficiency is staggering.
- Francisco Lindor: $34.1M, 0.9 WAR
- Edwin Diaz: $21.2M, -0.5 WAR
- Starling Marte: $20.7M, 0.2 WAR
- Brandon Nimmo: $20.5M, 0.7 WAR
- Pete Alonso: $20.5M, 0.4 WAR
The 5 highest-paid gamers on the Mets proper now may very well be adequately changed with minor leaguers and the crew would barely see a distinction. Oh, only for comparability Shohei Ohtani’s WAR to this point this season is 3.2 — larger than the whole Mets’ 5 mixed.
There isn’t anybody issue in charge for the 2024 Mets, however the one one who deserves a slight reprieve from being lambasted is David Stearns, the president of baseball operations who inherited this mess when he took over the job in October of 2023. It’s honest to acknowledge Stearns’ strikes haven’t been good since taking up, notably the hiring of supervisor Carlos Mendoza who appears each out of his depth, and unable to cease the Mets’ demise spiral — however this was such a poisonous group to take the reigns of that it’s going to take a very long time to show it round at this price.
Maybe an energetic commerce deadline, transport off the Mets’ spoiled items, and making an attempt to construct for the longer term is within the playing cards — however it’s unclear if possession will tolerate a “slow-and-steady” strategy after they’ve been desperately making an attempt to purchase wins and throw cash on the downside.
We’re left with the Cybertruck Mets. The customer-beware cautionary story of contemporary sports activities. A gleaming, avant garde experiment that will get slowed down in a foot of water, can’t climb a hill, and underneath the floor is held along with chewing gum. The promise of competitiveness: Gone. The hopes of one thing good: Crushed. The truth that this massive, silly hunk of gaudy metallic is being lapped by Honda Civics just like the Guardians and Orioles: A grim actuality.
Mets gamers held a players-only “Come to Jesus” assembly after their loss on Wednesday. The plan option to attempt to iron out their issues are discover a path ahead for the rest of the season. It’s in all probability a very good factor, as a result of at this level solely prayer can save the Mets — sort of like placing your life within the palms of a Cybertruck.
