When asked about the Mets’ success in 2022 and outlook ahead, executives around the league opined that the depth New York accumulated for the active roster last season was impressive. But spots from, say, 28 and beyond on the 40-man roster? Not so much.
The reason why it ended up being not as much of a hindrance to the Mets, who won 101 games, was because, until the final handful of weeks of the regular season, their position players largely avoided the injured list. That won’t always be the case, though. In fact, it’s rare for that to happen. That’s why one commonality among baseball’s most consistent year-to-year winners — read: the organizations the Mets would like to mirror in their quest for sustainable winning — has been strong 40-man rosters, with quality depth pieces beyond the active roster. The Mets aren’t quite there yet.
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However, New York, sources indicated, has been proactive so far this offseason in improving the deficiency. To be clear, this is not meant to be interpreted as the Mets bargain-shopping in lieu of spending on stars or prioritizing marginal improvement at the start of the winter — no, that’s not the case at all. It’s not an either/or thing — teams like the Mets need both great players at the top of the roster (something they have and will continue to try and obtain) and solid depth options well behind them (something they don’t have a lot of). It’s a small thing to the casual fan, but over the course of a 162-game season, it matters.
Take what happened late last season, for instance. After injuries on the infield to Luis Guillorme and Brett Baty, the Mets’ depth thinned out, and they called upon Deven Marrero, a light-hitting infielder whom they didn’t sign until July. In August, they claimed infielder Yolmer Sanchez off waivers. Point is, injuries happen, and it’s best to have other capable in-house options to address them.
So far this offseason, the Mets have checked in on relief pitchers who can be sent up and down from the minors and backup infielders with positional versatility, including Charlie Culberson, sources said. Interest in Culberson makes some sense because he hits lefties and has played every position in the majors except center field and catcher. Similar utility types on the market include Ehire Adrianza and Matt Duffy among a plethora of others.
Sure, Culberson is not the most scintillating name in free agency, but he’s probably a better option than others the Mets turned to late last season. He’s just one name of many possibilities who fit the description of helpful depth in the form of versatility, even if just stashed in the minor leagues. This is also another area where owner Steve Cohen’s wallet can come in handy. Wouldn’t a veteran looking to latch on with a new team seek a clearer path for playing time than the Mets’ situation? Maybe — and, this is just speculation — but perhaps unless he’s getting paid a bit more.
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The Mets could end up having some room to play with on the back end of their 40-man roster, and whether that includes additional pitching or position players is more of a function of availability. Regardless, upgrading the floor of their 40-man seems like a necessary, albeit unheralded, step the Mets are serious about.
Andrew Heaney is among several candidates for the Mets’ pitching staff that New York has made some initial contact with, said people briefed on the matter. Newsday first reported the Mets’ interest in the free-agent lefty starting pitcher. Heaney is an interesting option for the Mets, and not just because of his connection with Eppler and others in the Mets front office dating back to shared time with the Angels. Beyond that familiarity, there’s also just a lot to like from a stuff perspective, especially if Heaney is more of a mid-rotation addition (it’s not clear how the Mets would be viewing him) based on his injury history.
Last year, 13 teams expressed interest in Heaney, overlooking his ugly 2021 as a buy-low option. They thought that he would bounce back and perform similarly to how he ended up pitching in 2022 while with the Dodgers. On a one-year deal worth $8.5 million with Los Angeles, Heaney threw 72 innings and posted career bests in strikeouts per nine innings (13.6), ERA (3.10), WHIP (1.08) and K-BB% (29.4 percent). The Dodgers helped change Heaney’s mechanics and junked his curveball for more of a sweeping slider to complement his high-spin fastball. The result was a whiff rate that was in the top 4 percent of baseball. He also suppressed hard contact and avoided barrels better than he had in the past. The next step, scouts say, could be increasing the usage of his third pitch — the changeup — which he threw just 5 percent of the time last year.
That’s one reason why Heaney is said to be interested in joining an organization that could further help him tap into his upside. Heaney, 31, is also believed to be looking for a multi-year deal on a winning team. That probably shrinks the possible teams down from the amount of interest he had last year, but $26 million over two years is a reasonable estimate. The Dodgers didn’t issue him a qualifying offer, but probably shouldn’t be ruled out as a potential landing spot in addition to the Mets and others.
While it will play into the calculus, the Mets aren’t going to avoid a free agent simply because of an attached qualifying offer.
So, in theory, free agents such as Trea Turner, Carlos Rodón, Tyler Anderson and Nathan Eovaldi would be in play as options. It just depends. The Mets aren’t exactly salivating over the thought of trading from the upper echelon of their prospect rankings — they prefer to hold onto them and build sustainability, which takes around five or six years to do, GM Billy Eppler said — but putting together a winner via free agency may come at some kind of prospect cost, too, especially for the Mets. The Mets exceeded the luxury-tax threshold last season so their penalties for signing a player with a qualifying offer attached would be more severe. It would entail losing their second- and fifth-highest draft picks, as well as $1 million from their international bonus pool. Again, that won’t necessarily stop the Mets. But it factors into their thinking.
“It’s just baked into the overall acquisition cost,” Eppler said. “So it’s a calculation that you run. You do the math and if it makes sense, go ahead.”
Multiple times while talking with reporters during the GM Meetings, Eppler mentioned the trade market. It’s a path the Mets may take to address holes in their pitching staff. Executives from other teams said New York seemed to be looking.
Only Max Scherzer and Carlos Carrasco are penciled into the Mets rotation after New York picked up the latter’s club option last week. Lefty David Peterson remains a possible candidate to join them as an in-house solution while Tylor Megill and Joey Lucchesi are also options on the depth chart.
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The approach in trades, Eppler said, is similar to what it was at the deadline over the summer: The Mets’ preference is to keep their top minor leaguers.
“There were deals at the deadline where players inside of our top 10 were in them,” Eppler said. “It just wasn’t going to be a handful of players inside our top 10 or multiple players inside our top 10. If you look historically at some organizations that have built that sustainability, they haven’t really traded inside of their top four for the first four, five, six, seven years of that type of blueprint being constructed and then implemented.”
Still, Eppler added, that there’s room in the philosophy if the deal includes “the right player.” Perhaps — and this is just speculation — a pitcher with a few years of club control fits that description.
“There’s no absolutes,” Eppler said. “I don’t want to live in absolutes.”
While things may not heat up for free-agent starting pitchers until situations involving qualified offers are clearer, the trade market could see some momentum this week as teams look to maneuver space on their rosters.
Interest in free-agent pitcher Seth Lugo sounds robust, with more than a dozen teams expressing some level of interest. While it can quickly change, it’s nonetheless interesting given their holes in the bullpen that the Mets are not believed to be among that initial wave of teams. Also notable: a few teams have expressed interest in Lugo as a starting pitcher. In seven seasons, all spent with the Mets, Lugo, 32, has a 4.35 ERA and 1.33 WHIP in 194 2/3 innings as a starter and 2.91 ERA and 1.05 WHIP in 300 innings as a reliever.
(Top photo of Andrew Heaney: Ed Szczepanski / USA Today)