Going into the project, I had one goal: get a shortstop and a left fielder. Those seemed to be the Mets’ weaknesses in my mind…so I thought I would fix them. However, as I began to negotiate my first trade with the Tigers, I realized that I should also increase my payroll. Therefore, through each of my four trades made, I made over $13MM along with getting key players.
Another thing that I thought before I began was that there were going to be four no-trade candidates: David Wright, Matt Harvey, Juan Lagares, and Daniel Murphy. For the most part, I kept true to that statement, but I did go against it when approaching the Astros. Perhaps my best trade was between the Mets and the Astros in which I gave up Murphy and Dillon Gee, and got Jose Altuve and Dallas Keuchel in return.
When free agent bidding came around, I was only in need of a shortstop, and a left-handed pitcher. So, I all the rest of the money I had, and put it into signing Hanley Ramirez, Nori Aoki, and two left handed relievers.
Of course, by trading away Jon Niese, I did give up my only left handed starter, but with a rotation consisting of Harvey, Jacob deGrom, Bud Norris, Dallas Keuchel, and Zack Wheeler…I think I can deal with it. Also, my lineup will be looking like so:
1. Denard Span (RF)
2. Jose Altuve (2B)
3. David Wright (3B)
4. Lucas Duda (1B)
5. Hanley Ramirez (SS)
6. Travis d’Arnaud (C)
7. Juan Lagares (CF)
8. Curtis Granderson (LF)
9. Pitcher
Individual Salaries
New York Mets
I still don’t get the Span trade. He’s just doesn’t meet the Mets needs and Altuve can hit leadoff. Outside of that, I like the moves, although having Aoki on the roster seems redundant, but you got him for nothing so…
Span was acquired to fit the need for an outfielder. He can play any of the OF positions, and has the ability to leadoff. And if it were Altuve who led off, then there would be an issue on who would bat in the two slot.