The only sure things in life are death and taxes. Nobody knows that better than the New York Mets this morning as Day 3 of the Winter Meetings begins in Nashville.
On Tuesday, the Mets were feeling chipper and were on top of the world, oozing with confidence that they had made the first signature move of the offseason by signing their number one target Ben Zobrist.
While Jeff Wilpon hopped on a jet to Nashville so he could take the podium and announce the good news to the throng of baseball people gathered at the Opryland Hotel, manager Terry Collins held his own media session all wide-eyed and giddy, telling reporters that he texted Zobrist and that he was going to bat him second in the lineup come Opening Day.
After wining and dining Zobrist and his wife two days earlier, giving him the deluxe Citi Field tour, and then showing the happy couple some great housing options around the city, the Mets thought they had this one in the bag.
But alas, little did they know that Theo Epstein and the Cubs were watching and monitoring everything, hiding in the shadows, and courting Zobrist themselves.
While the Mets were joyfully speculating that the San Francisco Giants were probably out of the bidding because they knew Zobrist was very motivated to sign as close to home as he could, little did they know they were actually making the case for their Plan-A to sign with the Cubs who had already reached out to him.
John Ricco explained how marquee players like Zobrist were only too happy to play for the Mets because the Amazins were now winners with a bright future. Everything felt so right. Everything felt so good. What could possibly go wrong?
Then the four horsemen of the apocalypse suddenly appeared out of the fog in the form of Brian Cashman, Theo Epstein, Joe Maddon, and of course Ben Zobrist,. The End of Days had descended upon the New York Mets, sending them reeling into oblivion, never knowing or understanding what had just hit them.
Ben Zobrist had agreed to a four-year deal with the Cubs and worse yet, the deal was reportedly agreed to 24 hours earlier. All they needed to pull the trigger was for the Yankees to agree to take Starlin Castro off Chicago’s hands – and Brian Cashman was only too happy to oblige. The stage had been set.
The Mets never saw it coming. In fact, John Ricco was so confident Zobrist would choose the Mets, that an hour before Ken Rosenthal broke the bad news, he placed the odds at 80% that Zo would sign with the Amazins. Keep your day job, John.
Well here we are in the aftermath of a debacle, as Joe Maddon awakens and says he loves the smell of napalm in the morning. “It smells like victory.”
“The Mets will move forward,” Ricco said at a somber press conference. “We will move past this.”
Now Daniel Murphy is back in the limelight, but only if he’ll take a one or two year deal. Yeah, like that’s happening. Neil Walker is now looking more interesting than he did 48 hours ago, but no way the Mets give them the controllable young stud they are looking for.
How bad could Asdrubal Cabrera be? Right? Oh wait, we still have Dilson Herrera. He’s the guy the Mets were parading up until the moment we found out they were really preparing their full court press for Mr. Zobrist – red carpet and all.
But in all seriousness, what will the Mets do now? The truth is they probably don’t even know themselves, and that they’ll likely be spending most of today trying to figure that out.
They could switch gears and engage on Gerardo Parra, but while the Mets were focused on Zobrist, he says he wants a four-year deal and not the three-year contract the Mets were hoping for.
My gut tells me today will be all about developing their Plan-B which was something they probably spent to little time focusing on with the feeling that Plan-A was a cinch.
Today should be a very interesting one for our woozy Mets. However, Ricco was right about one thing last night… The Mets will move past this. We may not know what all the pieces will look like right now, and where exactly they will fit in the puzzle, but we’re going to be just fine without Ben Zobrist. I know that in my heart. Who knows, maybe this was all just a blessing in disguise.
