Marc Carig of Newsday decided to give his two cents about the Mets organization and their lack of transparency with their fans.
On Saturday afternoon, Mets COO Jeff Wilpon declined to comment on questions that were emailed to him regarding payroll. Wilpon hasn’t publicly touched that topic since Sept. 2014 according to Carig.
Carig had scathing words for the Mets ownership. Not just for this isolated incident, but rather for how things have been run on a grand scale.
“For years, the Wilpons have shown little willingness to level with their fans,” wrote Carig. “And with the Mets on the brink of squandering a window to compete for championships, they seem content to continue their blackout.”
“It’s a shame, really,” Carig continued. “For any business, accountability begins by addressing the customers. But if there’s one thing that can be counted upon, it’s the Mets doing the exact opposite of what makes sense.”
After being competitive for two seasons in a row, the Mets took a large step back in 2017 by finishing 70-92. Instead of using the offseason as a time to retool, the Mets have glided through a large chunk of it by doing little-to-nothing.
This comes off as confusing to many as it’s occurring at an interesting time. Not only could a few signings propel the Mets back into the relevancy they enjoyed from 2015-2016, but the money shouldn’t be a problem.
The Mets had an Opening Day payroll of $155 million in 2017. That was before gaining money back from David Wright‘s contract insurance and trading away Curtis Granderson, Addison Reed, Neil Walker, Lucas Duda, and Jay Bruce in the summer.
Not only did a large chunk of money come off the books, but all 30 MLB owners will be receiving a $50 million windfall which derived from the sale of technology that was used to stream baseball games on MLB.com.
However, even with all this money, Sandy Alderson made it known that their budget consisted around $30 million dollars.
So far the Mets haven’t even spent close to that. Sure there’s a lot of the offseason left, but the team is missing out on some of the best players for their budget.
Few Mets fans expected top free agents like Yu Darvish, Eric Hosmer, or J.D. Martinez to be signed by the team they loved. Still there were plenty of free agents within the Mets’ budget that they could’ve signed instead.
However, day by day we’ve seen players like Bryan Shaw, Brandon Morrow, C.C. Sabathia, Carlos Santana, Tommy Hunter, Miles Mikolas, Mike Minor, and Steve Cishek taken off the board one by one. Sure the Mets have shown interest in many of those players, but talk is cheap.
Joe D., Michael Mayer, Rob Piersall, and myself all came up with offseason plans that were reasonable and within the Mets budget. After the Winter Meetings, none of these plans can be completely fulfilled anymore because all the players we wanted are mostly signed now.
The Mets did not come out of the Winter Meetings with even half of what any of us would’ve liked to see. Sure signing Anthony Swarzak was nice, but it should’ve been a supplemental signing. As well as Swarzak performed in 2017, he will not single-handedly turn around a franchise.
So while Alderson still has a few months of the offseason left, he’s running out of time and players. At this point it would be surprising to see him even reach that $30 million mark. In the last few weeks he’s been subtly normalizing that their moves will be severely limited.
In mid-November he began backpedaling on the idea of adding a starting pitcher after mentioning the need for one earlier in the offseason. He also backpedaled on comments from earlier in the offseason that basically made Dominic Smith‘s chances of being the starter at first base in 2018 seem tenuous.
However, Alderson’s biggest normalization of not spending came from comments about payroll on Tuesday.
“I would spend a little less time thinking about our payroll,” said Alderson. “We’re trying to put the best team on the field that we possibly can. We want to fill a number of different roles.”
Carig’s sources say that even the front office isn’t quite sure about the Mets budget year-to-year.
“To the Wilpons, it’s as if nobody is worthy enough for a straight answer,” wrote Carig. “That’s the biggest failure of all. Just two years after winning a pennant, the Mets have wasted whatever goodwill they had with their fans, all because they refuse to speak with them.”
All Carig asks for is that the Wilpons are transparent with where money is going. He even credits Derek Jeter for being upfront even though he may disagree with his approach.
It’s hard for anyone to disagree with Carig. What he wrote reflects what many fans think currently and have been thinking for years. Why was it that the Mets were able to go over budget last year? Why is it that they can’t spend right now? When will be able to fully spend like a big-market team again?
Maybe some of those answers will not delight Mets fans, but it will at least give realistic hope instead of false hope.
Carig gives a comprehensive analysis of his faults with Mets ownership in his article for Newsday. Give it a read if you’re interested in getting his full perspective on the issue.
