Don’t look now, but the once 0-5 New York Mets are now 10-8.

Remember when the sky was falling?

Mandatory Credit: John Jones-USA TODAY Sports

Not only have the Mets recovered from their awful start to bring themselves right back into the thick of things, but they’ve done so against good teams. In fact, the Mets have the hardest strength of schedule in baseball, meaning no other team has had a harder first six series to begin the season. Additionally, no other team in the division places within the top-10 in the metric. The Washington Nationals are at No. 13, Miami Marlins at No. 15, Philadelphia Phillies at No. 16 and the Atlanta Braves place all the way down at No. 25.

Let’s start at the beginning of the year.

The Milwaukee Brewers, after sweeping the Mets to open the year, sit at 11-6 and are in first place in the NL Central. After the opening series, Rhys Hoskins and the Brew Crew went on to take series from the Seattle Mariners, Cincinnati Reds and, most impressively, the Baltimore Orioles. It’s one of only two series the Orioles have lost so far, the other we’ll get to later.

The Mets then got the Detroit Tigers, and while still in a rut for the better part of the series, finally pulled out of their nosedive and stole game three. That marked the first win of what would end up being a 10-3 run to get back over .500. While probably not a playoff team, the Tigers are right in that “one year out from contending” range, which will still lead to a lot of competitive baseball for them in the AL Central in 2024.

Next up were the Reds, who have one of the deepest rosters filled with exciting young talent in the league. It was in Cincinnati where the Mets won their first series of the year, taking two out of three games from the upstart Reds — the same team that took a series from the Phillies on the road just a few days prior.

Atlanta was next, and most Mets fans were probably going into the series down south happy to come away with one win and knowing that zero was very much on the table. The weather turned the four-game series into three, and even with that, the Mets still walked out of there with two wins against the powerhouse Braves.

Then, the red-hot Kansas City Royals came into town. Sitting at 9-4 and riding a seven-game win streak at the time, they proceeded to lose two out of three to the Mets. A lot of people just assume the Royals will be, well, the Royals again this year, but they have the potential to take a serious step forward. Bobby Witt Jr. is a superstar, the lineup around him is very capable and the rotation of Cole Ragans, old friend Seth Lugo, Brady Singer, old acquaintance Michael Wacha and Alec Marsh is rock solid.

Finally, that left the Pittsburgh Pirates. Like the Royals, they’re a team that a lot of people usually write off, but the roster is finally starting to see the benefit of all the years of losing. Similar to Detroit, they might be a year out from truly contending, but the roster has some legitimate talent on it.

Remember how there was one other team to take a series from Baltimore? Yeah, it was Pittsburgh. Coming into Queens at 11-5, the Pirates got swept. It was the first sweep of the year for the Mets, finishing off a homestand that was a complete 180 from how the year began.

All six teams the Mets have played this year are above .500. They’re one of four teams who can say that, and the only team within that group to have a winning record. 

Even if you remove the Mets from each opponent’s schedule, all six clubs would still have at least a .500 record.

Here are their records with those games not included:

Brewers: 8-6
Tigers: 8-8
Reds: 8-7
Braves: 11-3
Royals: 11-5
Pirates: 11-5

Aside from the Braves, none of the teams on the Mets’ schedule scream World Series contender. However, none of them are close to the bottom tier of the league either and are expected to remain relatively competitive throughout the course of the year. 

The Mets haven’t played a single game yet against that bottom tier of the league. No Marlins, no Nationals, no Chicago White Sox, no Oakland Athletics, no Colorado Rockies.

The fact the Mets were able to recover from the 0-5 start, and recover as well as they did, against a strong schedule of opponents is impressive.