MLB Preseason Favorites - Mets, Padres, Yankees: What Went Wrong?
The Mets, Padres and Yankees all made significant upgrades over the past winter, spending big bucks on their rotation, their bullpens, their lineups all in an attempt to make it to October and potentially make a run at the World Series. But as Murphy's law dictates - whatever can go wrong will go wrong. And for the Mets, Padres and Yankees, that's exactly what happened. Whatever could go wrong did.
So what really went wrong for these 3 teams? We begin with...
NEW YORK METS
The Mets under Steve Cohen have been no stranger to spending...and spending big. They lose arguably the best pitcher of a generation in Jacob deGrom to the Texas Rangers. Cohen counters by going out and signing AL Cy Young Award winner Justin Verlander to pair with Max Scherzer at the head of the rotation. Then the Mets lose their effective number 3 starter in Chris Bassitt. Cohen decides to counter by getting SoftBank Hawks ace and master of the devastating ghost fork Kodai Senga.
They then upgrade their catching with offensive catcher Omar Narvaez from the Brewers and pick up a right-handed DH upgrade with Tommy Pham. Add to it the re-signings of Edwin Diaz, Jeff McNeil, Ottavino, fan favorites Brandon Nimmo and Pete Alonso as well as the addition of former Yankees closer David Robertson, the Mets were looking to replicate their success from the previous season, where they went 101-61 and made the Wild Card round of the playoffs.
They got off to a 29-27 start through May and had hoped to avoid the infamous June swoon that had plagued them for years. But it wasn't meant to be as the Mets would go 7-19 in the month of June, but would still find themselves just six games below .500 heading into the All-Star Break.
However, things would freefall from there. Series losses to the Dodgers and the Red Sox coupled with a split of the Subway Series against the Yankees had the Mets at 47-54 with under a week left until the trade deadline and ready to sell.
So sell is what they did. Max Scherzer - traded to the Rangers for top prospect and noted Mets killer Ronald Acuna Jr.'s kid brother Luisangel Acuna.
Justin Verlander - shipped back to Houston for 2 top prospects: Drew Gilbert and Ryan Clifford.
David Robertson - dealt to the Marlins for a pair of Florida Complex League prospects in Marco Vargas and Ronald Hernandez.
Eduardo Escobar - headed to the Angels for 2 Double-A pitching prospects.
Mark Canha - sent to Milwaukee for pitching prosepct Justin Jarvis.
Tommy Pham - gone as well. He was dealt to Arizona for Dominican League prospect Jeremy Rodriguez.
The last of the offloads was reliever Dominic Leone. He was sent off to the Angels for Double-A infield prospect Jeremiah Jackson.
In the span of a week, the Mets bought a years long rebuild and look poised to contend for years to come. Look for them to be somewhat competitive in 2024 but come 2025 and on, the Mets may be the team to beat in the NL East if they can hang on to Pete Alonso. As for the end of this season, 75-80 wins would be a respectable mark to finish with for this disappointing Mets team.
SAN DIEGO PADRES
The Padres made some big splashes over the winter, as did the Mets. The biggest splash was signing Xander Bogaerts to an 11 year, $280 million megadeal that will have him in San Diego through 2033. They also filled out their rotation by getting veterans Michael Wacha and Seth Lugo as well as got some much needed depth with the signings of Matt Carpenter and Nelson Cruz. So what went wrong for them?
The bullpen did. With an ERA of just under 4, the bullpen blew critical games in May, June and August that pushed their records for those months below .500. Losing one of their big bats in Fernando Tatis Jr. for the first 20 games of the season did no favors, either. Juan Soto has also been held in check and Manny Machado's average has dropped over 40 points from where it was in 2022. The Padres are locked into bad contracts and their farm system looks fine but their top prospects are all blocked by other star players. And that's the danger in building superteams. You get locked into these megadeals, which doesn't allow room for your young prospects to get MLB service time and grow. For the end of this season, the Padres could go 80-82, build momentum for 2024. That would be considered a good season considering all that's gone wrong for them.
NEW YORK YANKEES
What can we say about the Yankees? Sure, they signed Carlos Rodon to bolster their rotation and extended their captain Aaron Judge after his record-shattering 2022 season. But other than that, they did next to nothing to improve their roster. At the deadline, they were 55-51, everyone was looking for them to sell...and they did nothing. It was injuries to Rodon, Rizzo and Judge that did them in. And for the Yankees, the call up of Dominguez just came too little too late to salvage any hope of a playoff run. 81-81 sounds like a fair record for the Bronx Bombers this season heading into 2024. But they need to make wholesale changes this winter and it starts with ditching GM Brian Cashman (which is highly unlikely) and removing Manager Aaron Boone (possible).
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