The day after the regular season ends is prime time for finger pointing in Major League Baseball and there's plenty of blame to go around with the New York Mets.
Owner Steve Cohen took to X on Monday to apologize to the fanbase after his $340 million team collapsed in the second half of the season, turning a 45-24 record into missing the playoffs.
“We were a better team, talent-wise, this year than we were last year,” a veteran Mets player told The Athletic. “Everyone will always compare this year versus last year. On paper, we are a much better team this year than we were last year, and I don’t think it’s necessarily close. It just didn’t work.”
The question of chemistry is a tough one to quantify. What's easier to see is that the Mets' defense just wasn't good.
“Their defense kills them,” one scout told The Athletic late in the season.
Another added, “Their best hitters are bad defenders and vice versa.”
Nobody epitomizes that better than Soto. Per Baseball Savant, Soto ranked in the 99th percentile in batting run value and the first percentile in fielding run value. He hit 43 home runs and led the league in stolen bases while being worth -12 outs above average in the field.
And that's just one of the superstars. Mark Vientos followed up a breakout first full season by hitting for a .702 OPS with a -0.2 bWAR. In the field, he rated at -7 outs above average.
The team's defense seemed to falter at the worst possible times, especially down the stretch as they committed 19 errors over their last 29 games.
A team source told The Athletic that improving their defense is the “biggest and most intriguing challenge this winter,” even while the offense jumped between productive to dormant, the bullpen lacked depth and the starting rotation never found consistency.
Perhaps Brandon Nimmo put it best — the team had the ability, maybe even moreso than any team in baseball.
“In my heart of hearts, this is the most talented team I’ve ever played on,” he said. “After the trade-deadline acquisitions, I truly believed this was a team that could win the World Series.”
