The New York Mets are one of the worst teams in the National League at 23-33, and owner Steve Cohen notably has sold when it looks like his team won't be contenders.
The New York Mets got off to a bad start this season, so much so that the team rattled off 12 consecutive losses in mid-April which dropped it to the bottom of the Major League Baseball standings.
Since then, the Mets are 16-17 over its last 33 games and whenever New York starts to build some momentum, the team falters. The Mets are no longer in the basement of the standings but are still the third-worst team in the National League.
New York has a run differential of minus-47 (24th), .226 batting average (29th) and .642 OPS (30th) with hit-or-miss pitching through 56 games this season. The Mets’ pitching staff ranked sixth in ERA (3.91) and 10th in WHIP (1.31), so the team’s arms are getting it done for the most part, but the two phases haven’t been good at the same time.
With the team far out of a playoff spot right now, it seems highly unlikely that the Mets will be buyers at the trade deadline later this summer. Obviously, there’s a ton of baseball left to be played and things can change drastically in the blink of an eye, but this roster doesn’t seem to have it.
Given the scope of how owner Steve Cohen operates when his teams are good or bad, the Mets could embark on a fire sale if the team doesn’t start winning a lot of games. At 23-33, the Mets came in at No. 25 in ESPN’s Week 9 Power Rankings.
“The last time the Mets were on the fringe of the playoff race come midsummer, in 2023, owner Steve Cohen was pretty clear-eyed in supporting a sell-off before the trade deadline,” ESPN’s Buster Olney wrote Thursday.
“On June 30 of that year, the Mets were 36-46, with their chances for making the playoffs assessed at under 10% at the time. They are on an even worse trajectory this season -- their winning percentage hovers around .420 in a highly competitive NL -- which means that if Cohen makes a similar decision, then Freddy Peralta and a few others could be on the move before the Aug. 3 deadline.”
Peralta, who was acquired from the Milwaukee Brewers in a trade involving infield prospect Jett Williams and right-hander Brandon Sproat, has pitched well but maybe not as good as New York had hoped up to this point.
Peralta is 3-4 with a 3.52 ERA, 1.27 WHIP and 63 strikeouts through 11 starts (61.1 innings) this season and could become available in the coming months. The two-time All-Star will be a free agent after this season, and if there are no signs he is going to extend with New York, the organization should get something for him.
There will be plenty of suitors looking for a quality starting pitcher ahead of a playoff push, so Peralta figures to be a hot commodity if New York continues to scuffle.
