Mets in good shape to make a playoff run: only 65 games to go
Mets outfielder Juan Soto reacts after hitting a home run against Atlanta during the seventh inning of a game June 25 at CIti Field.
The beauty and brutality of the baseball season can best be characterized by its lifespan.
We know the season is long, and there’s a certain integrity to that fact: A bad team can heat up, a good team can swoon, but at the end of 162, there’s very little either can hide.
And as the Mets embark on the second “half” of the season — really just 65 games — much of their core identity has come to the fore.
They’re not the unbeatable team that brought a .704 winning percentage into May, but they’re also not the troop of lost boys that scuffled its way through a June in which they went 12-15 and fell out of first place.
The hand-wringing about Juan Soto’s “slow start” was utterly overblown, but their pitching, which had the best ERA in the National League through the end of April, likely did overperform early on.
But even the most fatalistic of Mets fans — and they are legion, considering this team hasn’t won a title since the Reagan Era — likely can dig up a shred of optimism going into this stretch run. Barring a full disaster (and we’re not saying that’s impossible), the Mets are in very good shape, and while the first-place Phillies are a tough out, it’s realistic to expect this team to reach the playoffs.
For one, they might have survived the worst this season had to offer.
This is a partial list of pitchers who were on the injured list on July 11: Kodai Senga, Sean Manaea, Tylor Megill, Dedniel Nunez, Max Kranick, Griffin Canning, Paul Blackburn, Brooks Raley, A.J. Minter and Jose Butto.
Add to that: It took a while for Soto to get in gear (and boy, did he hear about it), and though he won’t blame his injury, Francisco Lindor has cooled down significantly since suffering a broken toe in a mid-June game against the Dodgers. Mark Vientos’ sophomore slump hit like a Mack truck, but he has looked better of late. Francisco Alvarez was struggling so badly that he was optioned to Triple-A, where he has proceeded to hit the seams off the ball.
The Mets continue to struggle with runners in scoring position, though, and there’s no indication that’s changing anytime soon.
As for the actual positives, Pete Alonso is batting a career-best .280/.376/.532 and has honed a matured approach at the plate highlighted by an increased walk rate, better quality of contact and a higher hard-hit percentage.
Jeff McNeil has been an unsung hero of this offense: Since a July 5 game last season in which he homered off Pirates ace Paul Skenes, his 3.1 fWAR is third on the team and his wRC+ — weighted runs created plus, a metric that measures offensive production — is fourth. This is notable because those are both compiling stats, and McNeil missed significant playing time at the beginning of the year.
And Soto is simply Soto: Despite the onus of his record-breaking contract, since June 1 he leads the majors in wRC+ and weighted on base average and leads the National League in wins above replacement, as determined by FanGraphs.
As for the pitching, there’s really little doubt that the Mets could use a bullpen boost. Their third-base situation is unclear, and they’re not getting much offensive production from either the catching or centerfield positions, though Luis Torrens and Tyrone Taylor are top-tier defenders. The relief corps will get help when Raley and Butto return from injury/illness after the break, but if David Stearns is amenable, there are plenty of places to add at the July 31 trade deadline.
Still, getting Manaea and Senga back, as they did right before the break, is significant, particularly because their arms should be fresh down the line.
But of course, nothing in this sport is certain. Last year’s team overperformed expectations, but this year has far more of a “World Series or bust” feel to it.
The field is stacked, and not just by the usual suspects. Yes, the Dodgers are good, but the Tigers look indomitable. The Mets can be prone to swooning, and the bottom half of their lineup is a bit of a no man’s land. This is going to be a full-out battle, and they can only hope that they have the skill, preparation and resilience to withstand it.
And, again, the beauty and brutality of baseball is yes, how long it goes, but also how abruptly it can end.
Last year, we saw this team fight (and fight) for just one more game and one more game after that before falling to the Dodgers in the NLCS. The lesson was stark in its totality: Their win over Atlanta to earn a postseason berth, followed by Alonso’s franchise-altering, Wild Card Series-clinching homer against the Brewers, proved that there’s always another chance — another game, another at-bat, another shred of hope. Their 10-5 loss to the Dodgers in Game 6 of the NLCS underscored that there’s always another chance . . . until there isn’t. Not until next year, that is.
Spiritually, last year, with its raucousness and unexpected dominance, felt a little like the 1999 Mets team that got eliminated in the NLCS. This year feels more like the team that came after that: Focused, driven, but imperfect. That one lost to the Yankees in the World Series.
By that metric, too, this season is one of baseball’s many next chances. They’ve got 65 games to make the most of it, and that’s no time at all.
Laura Albanese is a reporter, feature writer and columnist covering local professional sports teams; she began at Newsday in 2007 as an intern.
