- The Mets biggest decision this winter will be finding the right man to lead their front office. After a number of missteps, the Mets will look to some high profile names to come in and right the ship. Of the most noteworthy, Oakland’s Billy Beane may be the most realistic target, per MLB Network’s Jon Heyman (via Twitter). In the Mets favor is the fact that the Athletics are often looking to save money, and at this point in his storied career, Beane comes at a significant cost. Still, Beane has been the driving force behind a successful couple of decades of A’s baseball, and it’s hard to imagine him walking.
Mets Rumors
Rich Hill “Definitely” Plans To Play In 2022
Rich Hill will turn 42 years old next March, but the veteran southpaw told reporters last night that he “definitely” plans to pitch next season (Twitter link via Anthony DiComo of MLB.com). “The drive is still there and the ability is still there,” said Hill, who did not rule out a return to the Mets.
It’s hard to argue with the left-hander’s assessment. He’s not only wrapping up a 17th Major League season but is putting the finishing touches on a season that will see him shoulder his largest workload since way back in 2007. Hill has pitched in 32 games (31 starts) this season and racked up 158 2/3 innings of 3.86 ERA ball. He’s fanned 22.3 percent of his opponents against an 8.3 percent walk rate.
Hill isn’t inducing whiffs as often as he did with the Dodgers a few years ago, but he’s still inducing weak contact at rates well north of the league average. His 88.3 mph average exit velocity and 34.8 percent hard-hit rate are both strong marks, and those numbers actually improved following a midseason trade from the Rays to the Mets (87.2 mph exit velo, 32.3 percent hard-hit rate).
Pitching into his age-42 season would add another chapter to Hill’s remarkable comeback journey. The left-hander pitched just 75 2/3 innings in the Majors from 2010-14 and had become something of a journeyman reliever before parlaying a strong stint in indie ball into a dominant four-start run with the Red Sox late in 2015. Those four starts and 29 innings prompted the Athletics to sign Hill to a one-year, $6MM contract, and he continued his sudden dominance with the A’s before being traded to the Dodgers in a deal that netted Oakland right-hander Frankie Montas.
Hill spent the 2017-19 seasons in Los Angeles after signing a three-year, $48MM contract to return — a number that would’ve appeared unfathomable just a couple years prior. Even when he required elbow surgery in the 2019-20 offseason, he still drew plenty of interest and inked an incentive-laden, one-year deal with the Twins. He split the 2021 season between Tampa Bay and Queens, and he’ll now look to come back for an 18th big league campaign.
Since undergoing elbow surgery, Hill has seen his fastball velocity dip but has nevertheless remained effective. He’s pitched 197 1/3 innings dating back to Opening Day 2020 and logged a 3.69 ERA with a 22.2 percent strikeout rate, an 8.8 percent walk rate, a 36.2 percent ground-ball rate and 1.09 home runs per nine innings pitched. A team won’t sign Hill to be the ace of its staff, but he should have little difficulty finding another one-year deal to pitch in the middle of a rotation.
Noah Syndergaard Discusses Impending Free Agency
Noah Syndergaard made his long-awaited return to the Mets this evening, firing a perfect inning as an opener in tonight’s win over the Marlins. It was the right-hander’s first big league appearance since September 2019, as Syndergaard lost all of last year and almost the entirety of this season recuperating from a March 2020 Tommy John surgery.
Syndergaard is scheduled to hit the open market a couple months from now, setting up one of the more interesting free agency cases of the offseason. At his best, the fireballer is one of the game’s most fearsome starters. He entered play tonight with a 3.31 ERA over 716 career innings, including a 2016-18 stretch in which he worked 368 1/3 frames of 2.81 ERA/2.42 FIP ball.
It’s difficult to know precisely what to expect from Syndergaard coming off two almost completely lost seasons, though. Teams aren’t going to place much emphasis on his results over a lone inning of work, but Syndergaard’s fastball averaged 96 MPH in his return outing. That’s not quite his peak level of arm strength, of course, but it’s sufficient velocity to assuage concerns that his stuff completely evaporated over the long layoff.
After the game, Syndergaard discussed his upcoming free agency with reporters (including Tim Britton of the Athletic and Deesha Thosar of the New York Daily News). The 29-year-old said he’s “fairly confident” he’ll remain with the Mets beyond this season, although he cautioned that statement was speculative as opposed to an indication the club and his representatives at CAA were on the verge of any sort of agreement.
The qualifying offer is one potential form a Mets’ return might take. New York could tag Syndergaard with a QO, which would be for one year and is expected to land in the $19-20MM range. If Syndergaard accepted the offer, he’d lock in another year in Queens. Were he to reject and sign elsewhere, the Mets would receive a draft choice as compensation.
Unsurprisingly, Syndergaard didn’t directly answer whether he’d accept a QO if offered. But he told reporters he’d “be extremely grateful” to be tagged with a QO, adding that that outcome would be “definitely something I’m hoping for.” That’s a bit counterintuitive on the surface, since being attached to draft pick compensation could have something of an adverse effect on Syndergaard’s market. It’s possible he’d simply appreciate the symbolism of the offer as a show of faith on the Mets’ part in his ability to bounce back next season. And a QO would at least give Syndergaard and his reps an additional option; players tagged with a QO have ten days to decide whether to accept, giving them some time to explore the market early in free agency while having a solid one-year salary available as a fallback.
Syndergaard is one of two key QO decisions the Mets will have to make this winter. They’re reportedly leaning towards offering one to outfielder Michael Conforto in spite of his generally disappointing 2021 campaign. There’s certainly merit to the idea of potentially bringing back both Syndergaard and Conforto on significant one-year deals. If they were to get a healthy season from Syndergaard and/or a Conforto bounceback next year, those salaries would look plenty reasonable and they’d be significant boons to the club’s hopes of putting this year’s second half swoon behind them and competing in the NL East.
Were both players to accept, however, that’d push the Mets’ guaranteed payroll up to around $175MM, in the estimation of Jason Martinez of Roster Resource, before accounting for an arbitration class that’ll include the likes of Edwin Díaz, Brandon Nimmo, Dominic Smith, J.D. Davis, Pete Alonso and Jeff McNeil. Those raises would take the Mets right up to or perhaps even past this season’s estimated $203MM player tab, and that’s without considering the possibilities of extending Marcus Stroman or Javier Báez and making outside upgrades. That’d leave the front office — and its still-unknown incoming president of baseball operations — potentially looking to trade away some established members of the roster, unless owner Steve Cohen is willing to dramatically ramp up spending in his second year atop the franchise.
Mets Shut Down Jacob deGrom
Mets manager Luis Rojas told The Athletic’s Tim Britton (Twitter links) and other reporters that ace Jacob deGrom has been shut down for the remainder of the 2021 season. “There’s no sense to” letting deGrom pitch in what would essentially be a meaningless game, Rojas said, adding that deGrom would likely have been deployed if the Mets had still been in the running for a playoff spot. The skipper also said that there was no physical reason deGrom was unable, as the right-hander came out of a Monday side session looking “fine to pitch.”
The news officially ends deGrom’s season at 92 innings, with an 1.08 ERA and a set of extraordinary peripherals backing up the right-hander’s work. What was looking like a third Cy Young Award-winning campaign was hampered by several minor injuries, however, before deGrom was placed on the 10-day IL (and then the 60-day IL) with forearm tightness.
His rehab work contained at least one setback, and further concerns arose when Mets president Sandy Alderson said that deGrom had recovered from the “lowest-grade partial tear” in his right UCL. DeGrom went on record denying this statement, saying “my ligament is perfectly fine.” Rojas and acting GM Zack Scott had also previously said deGrom’s elbow issues weren’t related to any structural problems, which only added to the confusion over deGrom’s status. Today, Rojas stated that deGrom was expected to be ready for Spring Training.
Of all the problems that befell the Mets in 2021, losing perhaps the sport’s best pitcher for such an elongated period of time might have been the biggest setback. While the team continued to insist that deGrom would indeed be back at some point, New York’s nosedive in the standings made it something of a moot point. The Mets are 17-34 over their last 51 games, and are mired in a stretch of 10 losses in their past 11 games.
It isn’t any surprise that the Mets are now prioritizing deGrom’s 2022 readiness over a token relief outing or two, and next season is shaping up as particularly important one for both the team and the ace righty. DeGrom can opt out of his contract following the 2022 campaign, leaving his $30.5MM salary for 2023 (and the Mets’ $32.5MM club option for 2024) on the table in search of a more lucrative free agent deal. As great as deGrom’s track record has been, he’ll need to display good health in what will be his age-34 season in order to land such a contract if he does choose to opt out.
Mets Reinstate Noah Syndergaard From 60-Day Injured List
Noah Syndergaard is finally back in the majors, as the Mets have reinstated the right-hander from the 60-day injured list. Syndergaard will start the second game of New York’s doubleheader with the Marlins today, and officially act as the 29th man for the twin bill. Catcher Chance Sisco was designated for assignment to make room on the 40-man roster.
It was almost exactly two years ago that Syndergaard last pitched in a big league game, tossing seven innings in a 7-6 Mets win over the Braves on September 29, 2019. The former All-Star then underwent Tommy John surgery in March 2020 and was initially projected to return around midseason, but a bout of elbow inflammation delayed Syndergaard’s return even further.
Now, the man they call “Thor” will only make a cameo appearance or two in the Mets’ final few games, though Syndergaard will surely feel comforted by getting some proper game action under his belt before another long offseason. Syndergaard isn’t expected to work as a true starting pitcher, as he will serve as an opener today and could see work out of the bullpen for any other appearances.
Syndergaard’s extended absence was far from the only thing that went wrong for the 2021 Mets, and given how some pitchers don’t look quite themselves in their first outings back from TJ surgery, it isn’t any guarantee that a healthy Syndergaard would’ve provided a midseason boost even if he had met his projected recovery time.
Between a 2017 season that was limited to 30 1/3 innings due to injuries, and now the 2020-21 campaigns, Syndergaard has already endured three lost seasons in his brief MLB career. When he has been able to pitch, Syndergaard has looked like a top-of-the-rotation arm, posting a 3.31 ERA, 26.4% strikeout rate, and 20.7 K-BB% over 716 innings from 2015-19.
It makes for one of the winter’s more intriguing free agent cases, as Syndergaard will hit the open market at the end of the year. An argument can certainly be made that the Mets should issue a qualifying offer to Syndergaard, as a one-year contract in the $20MM range is a worthy investment for a frontline pitcher and Thor might be apt to take such a deal as a pillow contract to set himself up for a longer-term deal in the 2022-23 offseason. Retaining Syndergaard would also provide some rotation depth in the event that Marcus Stroman leaves in free agency.
On the other hand, the Mets might have some natural reservation about committing $20MM to a pitcher who has missed essentially two full years. With Robinson Cano’s contract returning to the books, the Mets will have less payroll space to either re-sign such noteworthy free agents as Stroman, Syndergaard, Javier Baez or Michael Conforto, or to acquire suitable replacements for the roster. Then again, owner Steve Cohen might not consider the luxury tax threshold to be an impediment for the Mets’ to-be-determined next president of baseball operations, and Cohen might be more motivated to spend big after his club’s disappointing season.
From Syndergaard’s perspective, he’ll at least get a bit of a showcase to prove that he is healthy, even if a handful of innings won’t necessarily assuage the concerns of any interested teams looking to sign him this winter. His free agent market could be hampered by the specter of draft pick compensation if he did reject the QO, but Syndergaard’s ceiling is high enough that an enterprising team could still be willing to take the plunge on more than one guaranteed year.
New York claimed Sisco off waivers from the Orioles in June, and the catcher appeared in only five games with the Mets at the big league level. Sisco had some respectable numbers in part-time duty with the O’s over the last two seasons, but his defensive struggles and a big lack of production at the start of 2021 led the Orioles to part ways with the former top prospect. For the season as a whole, Sisco is hitting only .149/.241/.189 over 83 combined plate appearances with New York and Baltimore.
Mets Place J.D. Davis On 10-Day IL, Designate Albert Almora
The Mets announced a trio of roster moves prior to today’s game, including the placement of third baseman J.D. Davis on the 10-day injured list due to a left hand sprain. The placement is retroactive to September 23, but Davis’ 2021 season seems in all likelihood to be over. In corresponding roster moves, New York activated righty Sean Reid-Foley from the 60-day injured list, and designated outfielder Albert Almora for assignment.
This marks the fourth time this season that Davis has had to spend time on the IL due to his bothersome left hand, and as a result, Davis made only 211 plate appearances over 73 games. Davis has also been in a rough slump for over a month, which further reduced his playing time since Jonathan Villar (who ended up getting the bulk of third base playing time during Davis’ IL stints) became the top choice at the hot corner.
Despite his late slump, Davis will still finish with very strong numbers during his abbreviated season. The 28-year-old has hit .285/.384/.436 with five homers over 211 PA, good for a 126 OPS+ and 130 wRC+. This essentially matches Davis’ overall slash line in a Mets uniform, since he has done nothing but hit since being acquired from the Astros prior to the 2019 season.
While hitting production hasn’t been an issue, Davis’ glovework as a third baseman and left fielder has been subpar, at times making him something of an odd man out as New York has tried to figure out to best deploy its roster. The Mets will face plenty of question marks in their infield this winter, and since they have already dangled Davis in trade talks, the club might be ready to move on. With three years of arbitration control remaining and those strong numbers at the plate, Davis would certainly draw some attention as a very interesting trade chip as the Mets look to upgrade the roster.
Known as a defensive specialist during his time with the Cubs, Almora was signed to a one-year, $1.25MM deal to provide some depth for the Mets outfield. As it turned out, Almora was pretty average with the glovework, he spent over five weeks on the injured list with shoulder problems, and his .321 OPS over 54 PA resulted in a minus-9 wRC+ and minus-11 OPS+. Since the start of the 2019 season, Almora has hit only .216/.256/.342 in 451 plate appearances, and he’ll surely have to settle for a minor league deal if he catches on with another club in the offseason.
Reid-Foley hasn’t pitched since June 30 due to right elbow inflammation. Between this long injury absence and several shuttles back and forth from Triple-A earlier in the season, Reid-Foley has tossed 20 2/3 innings (with a 5.23 ERA) in his first season with the Mets.
Mets Notes: Syndergaard, deGrom, Baez
Noah Syndergaard could be back on the Mets’ Major League roster on Tuesday, per Tim Healey of Newsday Sports (via Twitter). Syndergaard made two rehab appearances, setting him up for a week in the Mets’ bullpen before the offseason. The 73-81 Mets have not much to play for in this final week of game action, but there may be a small victory in once more seeing Thor suit up in a Mets’ uni before he hits free agency this winter. Syndergaard has not pitched in the Majors since 2019.
In other Mets’ news…
- Jacob deGrom continues to work his way back to full health after a frustrating and somewhat obfuscating extended absence. The Mets’ ace went on the injured list for the second time 71 calendar days ago. It wasn’t clear at the time that he would be out long-term. He threw a bullpen session recently, which could put him on track to make one appearance this year, per Healey. Once a clear-cut Cy Young frontrunner, deGrom is likely to finish the year with a 1.08 ERA/1.23 FIP across 15 starts totaling 92 innings.
- Javier Baez would be very much open to returning to the Mets next year to continue playing alongside his countryman and close friend Francisco Lindor, writes Gordon Wittenmyer of NBC Sports Chicago. Baez has put up an exceptional .303/.377/.538 line since joining the Mets, adding up to an impressive 4.3 rWAR/3.6 fWAR total for the year. The polarizing star will be an unrestricted free agent without a qualifying offer attached, so while he enjoys playing alongside his pal in New York, it may come down to a question of price point. For the Mets the issue is allocation of resources, as they already has Jeff McNeil and Luis Guillorme under team control, as well as Robinson Cano coming back from suspension. As well as Baez has played, the Mets may have greater needs elsewhere.
Mets’ Assistant Pitching Coach Ricky Meinhold Leaves Organization
Ricky Meinhold, the Mets’ assistant pitching coach and minor league pitching coordinator, has departed the organization in pursuit of other opportunities, reports Deesha Thosar of the New York Daily News. Thosar writes that other staffers with the Mets might follow Meinhold in looking elsewhere in the coming weeks, with the club preparing for significant change in the front office for the second straight year.
Meinhold was promoted to assistant pitching coach in January, working under pitching coach Jeremy Hefner. He also retained the minor league coordinator role he’d held for a little more than a year previously. Meinhold has a background in integrating data into pitching development, and Thosar notes he’d recently been under consideration for a high-ranking player development position with another club.
Hefner was hired as pitching coach over the 2019-20 offseason, an addition that predated the current front office structure and the hiring of manager Luis Rojas. His contract is set to expire at the end of the season, reports Andy Martino of SNY, but the former big league hurler remains highly-regarded in the organization.
The club also recently engaged in some discussions with Driveline Baseball founder and former Reds’ director of pitching Kyle Boddy, reports Michael Mayer of Metsmerized. However, Martino adds that those discussions aren’t expected to result in Boddy landing a position with New York.
Carlos Gomez Officially Announces Retirement
Former major league outfielder Carlos Gómez officially announced his retirement this afternoon in a ceremony at Milwaukee’s American Family Field (video via Adam McCalvy of MLB.com). The announcement finalizes the end of a 13-year major league career.
Of course, there hasn’t been much doubt that Gómez’s playing days had already concluded. The 35-year-old last played in the majors in 2019, and he hasn’t played professionally since wrapping up a stint with the Aguilas Cibaenas in the Dominican Winter League between 2019-20. Reports out of the Dominican Republic in January 2020 indicated Gómez’s playing days were likely coming to an end, but he hadn’t publicly finalized that decision until today.
Gómez ceremoniously hung up his spikes as a Brewer, with whom he had the best run of his career. Acquired from the Twins over the 2009-10 offseason, the electric center fielder spent the next four and a half seasons with the Brew Crew. At his peak, Gómez was one of the sport’s top power-speed threats. Between 2013 and 2014, the right-handed hitter posted a .284/.347/.491 line with 47 home runs. He chipped in 74 stolen bases over those two seasons while playing Gold Glove-caliber defense.
Gómez earned down-ballot MVP support in both of those campaigns, and few players could match his well-rounded skillset. Over that two-year stretch, Gómez ranked seventh among all position players in FanGraphs’ version of wins above replacement, trailing only Mike Trout, Andrew McCutchen, teammate Jonathan Lucroy, Buster Posey, Miguel Cabrera and Josh Donaldson.
Milwaukee traded Gómez to the Astros at the 2015 deadline for then-prospects Brett Phillips, Domingo Santana, Josh Hader and Adrian Houser. It proved an opportune time for the Brewers to add an influx of young talent still helping the team immensely today, as Gómez’s productivity was never quite the same from that point forward. As he entered his 30’s, Gómez bounced around the league with a few clubs. He ended his playing days with the Mets, ironically the team that initially signed him as a 16-year-old back in 2002.
Gómez appeared in the majors with six different clubs over the course of his career, although he’ll be best known for his peak in Milwaukee. He appeared in 1461 MLB games and hit .252/.313/.411 with 145 home runs, 236 doubles and 41 triples. Gómez stole 268 bases, scored 675 runs and drove in 546. He appeared in two All-Star Games and won a Gold Glove during his aforementioned star-level peak. FanGraphs and Baseball Reference each valued his career at around 25 WAR. MLBTR congratulates Gómez on a very fine career and wishes him all the best in his future endeavors.
No Current Discussions Between Mets, Billy Beane
There’s already been plenty of speculation regarding the Mets’ search for a president of baseball operations. They’ve been very loosely tied to notable names like Theo Epstein, Josh Byrnes, Chris Antonetti, and Derek Falvey in recent weeks, and chatter has picked up over the past few days about a potential run at another marquee executive: Athletics president of baseball operations Billy Beane.
Last week, Ken Rosenthal of the Athletic opined that the Mets should make a run at both Beane and A’s manager Bob Melvin with a plan to install Beane atop the baseball operations department and to bring Melvin in to replace Luis Rojas as manager. MLB Network’s Jon Heyman has somewhat vaguely suggested that Beane is “on the Mets’ radar” in the past few days (Twitter links), though as he notes, there’s no guarantee the interest would be reciprocated.
Andy Martino of SNY reports the Mets would indeed be willing to consider the Beane/Melvin pursuit. However, he adds that there have not yet been any discussions between the Mets and Beane regarding his interest in making that jump, nor have the Mets been in contact with the A’s about potentially granting Beane permission to interview for a position with New York.
It’s not especially surprising to hear whispers that Mets president Sandy Alderson could pursue Beane, who was a protégé of his during the 1990s. Beane succeeded Alderson as baseball operations leader of the A’s in 1997 when the latter took a position in the commissioner’s office. The two have remained close in the more than two decades since, and Alderson even returned to the A’s in an advisory capacity between his pair of stints with the Mets (as general manager from 2010-18 and since last offseason as president).
Alderson has been running day-to-day baseball operations in Queens this month. Last offseason’s GM hire Jared Porter was fired a few weeks into his tenure after revelations that he’d previously sexually harassed a reporter. Acting GM Zack Scott has been on administrative leave since September 2 because of a DWI arrest. That’s forced Alderson to assume a more demanding role, but he’s planning to step back into a broader team president role next season while relinquishing daily baseball operations tasks to whoever he and owner Steve Cohen tab as the next president of baseball operations.
It’s fairly typical for teams to refuse to allow front office personnel who remain under contract to interview with other clubs for lateral positions. Beane is already Oakland’s president of baseball operations and owns an approximate 1% stake in the franchise, so it’s difficult to envision the Mets presenting him a loftier title than the one he already possesses. (Beane would have to divest that ownership share in the A’s if he joined another MLB team). That said, it’s also plausible A’s ownership would make an exception to that general rule and allow Beane to interview for a lateral move — both out of respect for his accomplishments with the club and because general manager David Forst has long been viewed as Beane’s successor-in-waiting. Forst is “not considered a possibility” for the Mets, Martino writes.
Of course, there’d be no chance of a Beane/Melvin pairing in Queens if those two are uninterested in a change of scenery. Rumors about Beane departing the A’s to join a larger-market, high-payroll club have swirled for the better part of two decades, but he’s remained in Oakland to this point. Melvin has been A’s manager since the middle of the 2011 season, and the club exercised an option in June to bring him back for the 2022 season. Beane and Melvin have clearly been comfortable in the Bay Area and part of a steady leadership contingent in the organization for some time. It’s possible one or both would prefer to stay where they are, even in spite of the allure of a larger payroll and the chance to work with Alderson in New York.
Much remains to be determined in the Mets’ front office search. It’s at least easy to glean from initial reports that Cohen and Alderson are setting their sights high, targeting well-known and respected executives with plenty of experience running baseball operations departments elsewhere.
