It’s been a bit of a roller coaster ride here for the Mets in 2024. We had the 0-5 start, followed by winning 12 of the next 15 and then dropping three straight while scoring just three runs in 27 innings. And all of this happened while playing teams over .500 in the first 21 games. The result has been a 13-11 record. And now the team returns home from a West Coast trip and is getting ready to add J.D. Martinez to the lineup. So, it seems like a good time to check in and see how everyone is feeling about the team. There’s been enough good and bad things to justify both the rose-colored glasses crowd, as well as the Henny Penny folks.
The Mets have been winning without their best starter, the bullpen is better than anyone thought and the offense is clicking despite not having Martinez, having lost Francisco Alvarez to injury and receiving disappointing starts from Francisco Lindor, Jeff McNeil and Brandon Nimmo.
Meanwhile, the starters have trouble going five innings, much less seven, the bullpen is being overused, the catchers can’t hit and the defense is worse than expected. Plus we’re seeing both Harrison Bader and Brett Baty return to earth after good starts and now we’re pinning hopes on a 36-year-old DH with a bad back.
What’s your take?
How happy are you with the Mets' 13-11 start?
- Happy - especially with the schedule (53%, 9 Votes)
- Neither happy nor disappointed (24%, 4 Votes)
- Very happy - thought they'd be under .500 this year (18%, 3 Votes)
- Disappointed (6%, 1 Votes)
Total Voters: 17
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My concern lies with their inability to throw quality strikes. The Mets are very fortunate that hitting is behind pitching so far this year, or they can have the Astros’ record. The Mets have given up 4.90 BB/9 from their starters, dead last in MLB. In fact, the next closest at 4.62 are the Astros starters, which was expected to be a plus rotation. The Rangers with their pitching issues due to injuries are 27th at 4.18 and the Marlins are 4.24. The 26th team is the pitching hexed Rockies at 3.97, so a full walk per nine innings better than the Mets.
Granted, the Mets rotation is kind of a joke, but Severino at 3.00 BB/9 is ok. Quintana is next best at 4.91, and that was never expected. It just gets worse from there with Butto at 4.96, Manaea at 5.18 (I think Mendoza was sending a message by removing him despite the six run lead after 4.2 innings), and then Houser at 6.52. Those are signs of impending disaster and need to be corrected.
I agree that they are suffering from issuing way too many walks. They went from being the fourth best starting staff to way down in the pack in the space of a week. It also puts tremendous pressure on the relief crew when starters can’t go deeper into games. I am not sure if the starting rotation has the ability to go much deeper into games, but the less pitches they throw the better the chances are that they could do that. Whatever happened to pitching to contact? Of course if Noah Syndergaard could’ve done that he would’ve been a much more successful picture instead of a five inning guy throwing 100 miles an hour, but hitting 100 pitches by the fifth inning. The return of Senga will be a great help and Sooner than later, a few more farmhand may come up to pitch in the rotation. In the meantime, We have done pretty good for a number of our primary hitters, not remotely hitting their stride yet.
Christian Scott has shown he can perform all year but his home run trend is disturbing and flat out weird. Dominic Hamel has looked much better after starting the season poorly as well. I wish I could say the same about Mike Vasil but… I can’t.
I think once Senga is back the Mets will begin to consider the young starters in AAA as potential replacements for some of our poorly performing pitching.
AAA has former major leaguers, and substantially experienced career-AAAers that are not generally seen in AA. These players know what (prospect) mistakes to look for, how to recognize them, and how to pounce when they see it. That being the case, Scott’s HR total may not be weird, it may be a flaw that he simply needs to learn to correct.
I don’t think Dominic Hamel warrants being characterized as having started poorly. He had one bad game. It happened to be the fist game of the season, so “started poorly” may be semantically, but it skews the practical reality.
I didn’t love the qualifiers. They are about where I expected them to be. Happy so far. Picked them for 84 wins this year. A flawed, slightly above average team — with upside — and headed in the right direction.
I think that’s a fair criticism.
The issue for me is that so few people vote in the polls compared to the ones who view it that it’s hard to have more than 3 choices. I had four here, could have easily had six. But at this point, four choices is pushing it.
We used to regularly have well over 100 people voting in the polls. Not sure why that’s no longer the case.
After an 0-5 start I’m freaking ecstatic. Severino a pleasant surprise and I’m downright shocked at Marte’s bounce back, i thought he was done. Definitely need to push the starters to go deeper into games.
Cautiously optimistic. Small sample sizes, I agree with Stearns that it will take 45 games to get a more accurate gauge. They also need to avoid the June Swoon they had last year.
It was a lousy start to the season–my best friend from over 45 years died suddenly right before opening day (his funeral was on opening day). Then the Mets dropped five in a row. Then the win streak to lift everyone’s spirits. Then too many late nights in SF.
For me, the season really gets started this Friday. Plus, Syracuse comes to my hometown Lehigh Valley for a long set on May 7.
LGM!
Very happy with how they’ve played against the level of competition.
I take issue with “the bullpen is better than anyone thought”. I predicted they wouldn’t blow a single game all year with a lead after the 8th and that the Mets would have the lowest team ERA in baseball. So I may be wrong, but i certainly expected them to be very good.
There’s a difference between thinking the guys who pitch in the 8th and 9th inning are going to get the job done and thinking that all eight members are going to be above average. Of the 8 guys in the pen right now, the worst one is Jake Diekman with a 3.38 ERA. The average reliever in MLB has a 3.90 ERA. As a whole – even with the lousy performances by Grant Hartwig, Yohan Ramirez, Cole Susler and Michael Tonkin – Mets relievers have a 2.95 ERA in 94.2 IP. That’s outstanding.
Happy – especially with their schedule. They are competing and winning games against teams that have winning records. Their bullpen is exceptional. They are keeping them in games and get a lead they don’t lose it.