ESPN just put out its winter power rankings, and oddly enough, there wasn’t much change in position for the New York Mets. They went from 14th to 12th, which is decidedly strange given that the New York media and most national baseball writers have been consistently killing the Mets for letting first baseman Pete Alonso and Edwin Diaz leave via free agency, and for trading outfielder and fan favorite Brandon Nimmo to the Texas Rangers for second baseman Marcus Semien.
There were some intriguing questions asked in the summary of the Mets situation, with the attribution given to long-time baseball writer Buster Olney.
As noted in the writeup, the Mets haven’t spent a lot—in fact, they’ve lowered the long-term money they have to lay out in the contracts for new closer Devin Williams and Semien. Given that only three questions were asked about when the Mets will do a bigger spend, let’s look at them individually and do some creative speculation.
Will [the spend] be a shorter-term deal with Kyle Tucker?
This feels unlikely for one simple reason: Why would Tucker do it? His future is still swirling around in the rumor mill, but so far there’s nothing that indicates he’ll have to consider a short-term deal of any sort. It would be a creative coup for the Mets, though, if they could get him to do it.
A long term deal with Ranger Suarez?
This is another intriguing idea, but Stearns isn’t doing any long-term deals, based on what we’ve seen so far. He already has his future ace in starter Nolan McLean, with pitchers Brandon Sproat and Jonah Tong not far behind. They might not all succeed, but everything Stearns has done so far says he wants to give them a shot, with backup coming from trades involving at least one older Mets starter.
A bet on Cody Bellinger, to pluck another former Yankee?
This one would involve a bidding war, perhaps, which is something the New York media would love. It would also likely involve a longer-term deal, so once again that goes out the window given the consistency of Stearns’ approach to date.
So what’s the final answer?
Sadly—at least from a media perspective—it’s none of the above, based on what we’ve seen to date. Stearns will draw from his list of trade candidates, which includes pitchers Kodai Senga, Clay Holmes and David Peterson, plus position players like infielder Mark Vientos, and take a fill-in-the-blanks to the Mets’ current holes.