After a Winter Meetings filled with plenty of rumors and trade talks, general manager Brodie Van Wagenen and the New York Mets have found themselves a starting catcher.
On Sunday evening, the Mets and veteran catcher Wilson Ramos agreed to a two-year $19 million with a team option for the 2021 season (pending a physical). Ramos, 31, is coming off a season in which he hit .306/.358/.487 with a 130 OPS+ and 15 home runs in 111 games.
The MetsMerized staff held a roundtable discussion, and our writers shared their opinions on the Mets new starting catcher:
Tim Ryder: Brodie keeps making the right moves. A few more solid additions and truly competing in 2019 might not be such a far fetched idea. Keeping this core intact while providing a clear offensive upgrade behind the plate is an immeasurable win for this organization. Onward and upward, Brodie!
Jack Ramsey: It’s hard to see how the Wilson Ramos deal can be looked on poorly. The Mets got a bargain for a slugging catcher, while they were able to hang onto valuable assets like Nimmo and Conforto. Brodie seems to be pushing all the right buttons, and theres every reason to believe he continues his strong off-season.
Dilip Sridhar: This is a great move for many reasons. The first being that the Mets won’t be trading Brandon Nimmo or Michael Conforto. The second is that Wilson Ramos is a really good hitter. When healthy, he’s going to make a lot of fans happy and he’s going to be a huge piece of the Mets offense. The health will be a concern but I think the Mets can compensate for his health issues with Travis d’Arnaud and Tomas Nido. Good move, Brodie. It’s not even the holidays and the team has improved quite drastically.
John Flanigan: Brodie Van Wagenen continues to push all the right buttons. First Cano/Diaz, then Familia, and now Ramos. This is a tremendous deal for the Mets. At just the cost of $19 million, they are without a doubt a better team than they were yesterday. Ramos is one of the top offensive catchers in the game. In 111 games last season he hit .306/.358/.487 with 15 home runs.
And being that they didn’t spend as much as they would’ve on a Grandal type, the Mets still have the flexibility to fill the remaining holes on their roster (outfielder and lefty reliever). There is no reason to believe why BVW won’t continue to make the Mets a stronger team heading into the 2019 season.
John Sheridan: This is a not move without risk. A Ramos-d’Arnaud tandem should have Nido and Mazeika ready at any moment to fly to LaGuardia. Also, Ramos’ pitch framing abilities are an ill-fit for a team built on pitching. That all said, this was a shrewd move akin to the Familia signing. You’re getting a guy who makes you better, especially offensively, and you’ve assured you’re not left trying to talk yourself into Maldonado after Ramos and Realmuto went potentially elsewhere.
John Jackson: J.T. Realmuto and Yasmani Grandal are the better players, but Wilson Ramos was the better deal. The Mets wouldn’t have gotten Realmuto in a trade without giving up a major piece like Noah Syndergaard. Making a trade like that would have given them arguably the best overall catcher in baseball right now, but only after giving up one of the best starters in baseball at the same time.
Grandal on the other hand would’ve cost more money, more years, their second-highest pick in the 2019 MLB Draft and $500,000 of their international signing bonus money for 2019-20. The first two factors would have limited who the Mets could pursue for their last two items on their offseason to-do list, which are an outfielder and left-handed reliever.
In the end, the Mets got an All-Star catcher who hit .306/.358./.487/.845 with 15 homers and 70 RBIs in 382 at-bats and 111 games last year. That all comes at the price of $19 million for two years, with a $10 million team option for a third year.
Jack Hendon: From the perspective of what the Mets gave up, this was a huge win. $19MM over two years is a perfectly reasonable salary, perhaps even more so stacked up against the fact that the next best alternative involved sacrificing big league talent to a division rival for J.T. Realmuto.
We should, however, keep an open mind to the fact that Ramos was not the best option on the market altogether (that label goes to Grandal), and the negatives holding him back are very real. He had pretty much stopped running around the bases by August because of his hamstring issues – one of many maladies he’s run into over the last three years. An OPS above .750 can only go so far when it comes across a 75-game sample. His value as a framer aren’t that pretty, either.
This isn’t to say Ramos doesn’t bring something exciting to the Mets, because he’s still quite an improvement over Plawecki and d’Arnaud. But fans should be aware that even as the Mets make a statement, there’s a lot that remains to be seen.
* * * * * * * *
So what do you think? Are you for or against the Wilson Ramos signing? Perhaps you have more of a wait-and-see approach. We look forward to continuing this discussion in the comment section.
