New York Mets: Spring 2026 Hopes Down the Facking Drain

When I watched postgame interviews/pressers with Mendoza this season I’ve been thoroughly impressed.

He’s one of the, if not the, best manager and he’s doing this all in his first year at the job!

went to the game tonight and am going tomorrow, what a ride, LGM

Bet NL Pennant in May at 50:1, LFGM!

my luck..... tonight it happens, lindor alonzo 2 hits... one game off

NLCS .chip and a chair, here we go

Mendoza finished 3rd in nl manager of the year. What??? Ive never seen a team hang through bad times and then go on a run like that. By run... I mean best team in baseball for months. I don't get it.

I thought Mendoza was a lock.

Knew Mendoza was a lock to lose because I still listen to WFAN. You guys need to keep up more with how the fish think. 😉 This was openly being talked about and the consensus among both callers and hosts was he had 0% chance to win it.

While the reality of the Mets is they played as the best team for the last 4 months despite having a roster that didn't look like it was that good....

the fan perception (both mets fans and mets detractors) is...

"the Mets had a hot September, are equivalent to the Detroit Tigers and snuck in despite having the highest payroll which means they should be a powerhouse so its really not so impressive and tbh they kinda suck"

There's definitely some "anchoring bias" at play here. Funnily enough, the team after going into 2024 underrated and underrated throughout the season even after months of winning, will likely go into 2025 slightly overrated because "they got Soto" Since MOY doesn't take into account playoffs, they'de probably have to finish with a better record than the Dodgers or something for him to win that.

Great post.
Didn’t the Mets have the highest payroll in the majors because they were still paying most or all of contracts to Verlander and Scherzer!?

Pay Pete now or the Phillies will.

haha yeah, it was a solidly built "low income" roster by a good GM that was still shelling out money to people no longer here by the idiot GMs, though at least they replinished the minors with trading those guys. Pete Crow Armstrong would still be here if they had Stearns earlier, oh well.

Time for Soto to go back to clean up, he seems fixed. Line drive homers, sick...If anything good can come of losing everyday, let it be that. With him fixed our 1-4 hitters are as good as anyone in league.

Last year I came in here in May saying this team looks great to me and I am perplexed how they are doing so bad. This was based on the fact that they were hitting in every game, whether they scored or not, they were walking, they were hitting line drives, they were hitting. The losses piled from the bullpen giving up a lot of runs, which is just variance. All bullpens are mostly the same and they all suck.

This year now at the start of July I have the opposite opinion. This team is absolute garbage and will likely miss the playoffs, but as usual though the fan an spots pundit analysis is bad. People are fixated on the pitching, which is just injured, and slumping. That's variance. The reason this team stinks, starts and ends with it's hitting.

Mark Vientos sucks
Francisco Alvarez sucks (Luis Torrens sucks)
Tyrone Taylor (who looked OKish at the dish last year) now has been exposed to suck
Brett Baty sucks (ok this we kind of expected)
Ronny Maurico so far has sucked
Nimmo is not the same player, aged 10 yrs in the last year
Marte is not the same player, aged 100 years in the last year
Iglesias who was awesome is now gone (yeah he sucks now too but the production is still gone)
Lindor has also had a bad year for him funnily enough, even though no one wants to admit it, could be his toe injury

They added Juan Soto but he can't make up for the entirely lineup (except Alonso) not giving you what you expected. Furthermore they aren't hitting into "tough luck" either like I saw a lot early in 2024. Most at bats are weak, there are very few lineouts, just a plethora of K's and weak hit pops.

Stearns did a great job bringing in 10, 000 pitchers and if he didn't do this they'd be in even more trouble than they are now. An additional reason for the bullpen slump aside from variance is probably all the overuse to win every game 3-2 early in the season beacuse....
Mark Vientos Sucks, Francisco Alvarez sucks.... etc etc etc

This is not Stearn's fault, you can't have an entire core fail (most of which he didn't even put there) and expect to win. Fans just need to accept the team blows, and wait for next year when they can replace some of them. I know across town Cashman wastes $$ on guys like Max Fried, but you have to understand, all pitchers are 100 mph pitching machine who pitch like 30 IP on average a year and then get thrown in the garbage for the next one to do the same thing when they get boo-boo. Today's game starts and ends with good hitters and pitching DEPTH, not name pitchers. If they signed Fried instead of Holmes, maybe they'de have a couple extra wins at this point with the same dark cloud hanging over them. All pitcher's live on the DL. The Yankees having him pitch great with 0 injuries so far is the epitome of run-good, stop being jealous of 1990's mentality to GMing. Trading for Sandy Alcantra or any other loser like that would be a huge mistake. If anything the Mets should sell someone like Peterson.

This also isn't Mendoza's fault either. He also wasn't "amazing" last year. All MLB managers do what some nerd with a computer tells them to do, their job is essentially babysitter to spoileg Gen Z brats (if thats the current name for the generation of 20 yr olds, i can never remember this) Managers are meaningless.

TLDR Summary:

The only thing that matters now in baseball is OPS, good defense up the middle, and having a million or so pitchers on your roster so they can replace each other when they all get injured. The Mets don't have the first and most important thing, and they ran extra bad with the injuries so they lost out on the 3rd thing.

Season over. Go Mets 2026

"It ain't over until it's over."-----Yogi Berra

So the Orioles give off a lot of their strong lefty-handed bats the day off because its both a double header, and David Peterson, a lefty is pitching.

This create a situation where good lefties are sitting on the bench and there are a lot of horrible righties in the lineup.

You let Peterson start the 8th and he gives up a a ground ball opposite field single to the 6th hitter, so ya know.... nothing to indicate hes done, he's at 90 pitches.

The 7-hitter, a right handed batter with a career .091 avg and 3 IP this year. (The dude is basically a pitcher hitting in 2025) ... Gunnar Henderson and company on the bench.

Now if Peterson is done he's done, but to actually say in postgame you pulled him because "righties were due up"....

Ya know, if the other teams manager is sitting on his bench, hoping to god right handed reliever comes in to face the bottom of his order, so he can have Gunnar Henderson pinch hit for an automatic out....maybe idk, don't do that? The Orioles only other options would have been to pinch hit with them against Peterson, or to pinch hit for their actual good hitters in the 9th against Diaz, or not use them at all.

Unreal stupidity. But we get more in G2.

Now this one was way more subtle, and it didn't cost the game, but it was just something only someone with no basic logic skills would do.

The Mets are down 4 in the 9th. They have 2 on and 1 out. the 8 and 9 hitters are due up. Both of them suck so Carlos decides he wants to pinch hit for them with Torrens and Maurico, they're both better than the guys due up so it makes sense.
But his ordering was to have Mauricio PH first and then Torrens 2nd.
Mauricio is faster than Torrens and has a lot of power, Torrens is a catcher with no power and the last catcher off the bench. There is no logical reason why Mauricio should bat first.

I think Mendoza did this because he was afraid of Torrens hitting into the DP, meaning he held Torrens back, to bat as the tying run .... BECAUSE HES SLOW!
Carlos, omg. Like seriously dude omg. So ya know. If Maurico gets on base first, Torrens is STILL gonna come up in a double play situation. If Maurico makes an out first, then yes you avoided the double play situation... but now the situation is ONE MORE OUT ENDS THE GAME ANYWAY!!

Literally the only way this can possibly work out for him is if

1) Mauricio hits an extra base hit
2) Torrens then grounds out for the 2nd out

ok if they both do EXACTLY that you gained something, but what are the odds of that? and even if that does happen that's preparing for a situation that will probably lead to a loss anyway because one of them made an out.

What's more likely is he can't even think ahead 1 batter. Torrens woulda been up in a double play situation right NOW, so avoid it. Peterson is facing a righty right NOW, so avoid it. If you can't think ahead 1 move either he needs to go, or if the players loooove loooove looooove him, then fire the bench coach, have someone capable of basic strategy reminding him of basic strategy. I'm fine with keeping him, managers are all stupid glorified baby sitters anyway, but this is too stupid to tolerate.

I interupt with Good news, Senga back tonight.

That was a tough loss for peterson, I was listening on radio. I like that audibile app, can just put it on my phone and listen. Pay attention every once and awhile. He did well, last time I listened he was hitting people coudnt throw a strike had a bad 5 run inning. Also he made all star somehow.

But anway... he pitched a nice game that went to poop.

6 wins in a row.

We are back! We are getting Doug back!

/Hangover reference

Back and looking good McLovin.

Baty played so well the rumors are Vientos on the trading block. Id like to see them both stay but I guess a good problem to have with teams looking to trade

If Cedric Mullins was on the Mets to start the season, and Jeff McNeill had been a career Oriole, the Mets could have traded for Jeff McNeill at this deadline and people would be ecstatic at the upgrade in CF

Mullins is a classic player who sucks but overvalued by every team, except the team he's currently on, because we've "heard of him"

.738 OPS this season, .721 OPS, 2022-Present
-1.1 dWAR this season, 1.0 dWAR combined last 4 seasons

Mcneil is .799 OPS this season, .756 last 4 seasons, (in a more pitcher friendly ballpark)
His dWar is -0.2

The Idea Mullins gets to just start because he was good for one year 10 years ago, and makes highlight grabs while failing to make easy plays is dumb.

McNeill was also really good one year a while ago, who cares.

(This isn't an I love McNeill post btw, just a Mullins blows post)

This team is completly rented, everyone is gone soon. I like them, I'll root for them but this is a one and done if I've ever seen it. I see what your saying BobOjedaFan, I think they are trying to give some Defense out there without having to play taylor imo.

All INS can be fun, I have been known to jam a9 off in spot where I should not be doing that. Im in, doesnt look so hot right now but hey, who knows. We have a real bullpen now, if the guys start hitting we can make a run for sure, we no longer have to bite fingernails waiting for diaz. so... lets go. Why not

hate being right all the time.

****ing Mets man.

This is why we can’t have nice things.

feels bad.

- Tigers and Mets

Mets are more done than a steak at Sizzler circa 1995.