After many months of waiting, the New York Mets will finally kick off their season this Friday, playing the Atlanta Braves at 4:10 ET. The Mets last hosted a game at Citi Field on September 29th, when Dominic Smith hit a walk-off home run against the Braves to close out the season. When the two division rivals meet again on Friday, it will have been exactly 299 days since that game.

New York hopes to build off a solid second half last year, which saw them win 46 of their final 72 games to finish just three games out of a Wild Card spot. If the Mets can win at that same .639 clip for this 60-game season, they will likely find themselves playing baseball in October.

It all starts with Jacob deGrom taking on last year’s NL Rookie of the Year runner-up, Mike Soroka. Here’s my take on the Mets Opening Day lineup and some predictions for the 2020 season.

Starting Lineup

1. Brandon Nimmo, CF – Expectations were sky-high for the Wyomingite last year, as Nimmo was coming off an outstanding campaign in 2018. Unfortunately a neck injury derailed his season, limiting him to just 69 games played.

Still, when he was healthy across 26 games in September, Nimmo hit .261/.430/.565, with five home runs and 15 RBIs. Nimmo’s knack for getting on-base should prove invaluable this season, especially with the big bats that will hit behind him.

2. Jeff McNeil, 3B – After seeing Pete Alonso penciled into the two-hole in each of last weekend’s exhibition games, it is fair to wonder if it will be Alonso batting second instead of McNeil. Looking back at the Mets lineup on September 25th however (the Mets last game of the 2019 season before being eliminated from the playoff race), it was McNeil batting second with Alonso behind him.

As they say nowadays, bat your best hitter second and I still am a proponent of that title belonging to McNeil. The 2019 All-Star comes into this year with a career .321 batting average, and seems destined to win a batting title sooner rather than later. McNeil’s 143 wRC+ was tied with Alonso last year for the ninth-best mark in all of baseball.

3. Pete Alonso, 1B – Batting the Polar Bear third makes a lot of sense for the Mets, as he can conceivably drive in three runs with one swing of the bat in the first inning, instead of just two. Alonso was the premier slugger in the National League last season, with his all-time rookie record of 53 home runs. No home run record will fall this season, but we all will be wondering how many dingers the slugger can mash in a 60-game schedule.

Is 30 home runs out of the question? Most likely, but it is hard to bet against Pete Alonso.

4. Michael Conforto, RF – While Alonso, McNeil and the other young stars grabbed a majority of the headlines in 2019, Michael Conforto quietly put together a career-year. Conforto set career-highs in home runs (33), runs batted in (92), doubles (29), runs scored (90) and even stolen bases (7). Even with the addition of a healthy Yoenis Cespedes to the lineup, there is no reason for the Mets to move Conforto any further down in the lineup than the cleanup spot.

5. Yoenis Cespedes, DH – The 34-year-old Cuban slugger is finally set to rejoin the Mets lineup this year and looks primed to make a big impact. Cespedes told reporters on Tuesday that he will be starting on Opening Day as the designated hitter, a position he is likely to spend the majority of the time at this season. While it is usually hard to put expectations on a hitter who is two years removed from his last big league at-bat, Cespedes’ talent does not seem to be effected from the absence.

Let’s not forget that across his Mets career, Cespedes has been prolific whenever he has been able to get to the dish. His career .543 slugging percentage as a Met puts him one point ahead of Mike Piazza for the best mark in franchise history. Let’s see if he can finish this year still ahead of Piazza in that category.

6. Robinson Cano, 2B – After batting Robinson Cano third in each of the exhibition games against the Yankees, many fans began to wonder if that will continue into the regular season. While you can never rule anything out, it appears more likely that Cano was batting third to get him more at-bats after his late arrival to camp over anything else.

While he may be batting lower in the lineup than he is used to, Cano can still have a great impact on the offense this year. In the second half of 2019, Cano hit .284/.339/.541, with nine home runs and 21 RBIs across 42 games. Even at his advanced age, Cano is capable of carrying a lineup for a stretch. Hopefully he has a few more hot streaks left in the tank.

7. Wilson Ramos, C – In his first season with the New York Mets, Wilson Ramos was remarkably durable playing in 141 games and starting 115. Across all of those starts, Ramos only batted lower than sixth in the lineup seven times. While he may crack the top six for some of his starts this year, the depth of the Mets really begins to shine through as we get to the bottom-third lineup.

While you would like to see Ramos tap into a little bit more power, he is still coming off a year in which he batted .288/.351/.416, with 73 RBIs. It has been a long time since the Mets got that level of production from their starting catcher. Of course there is still some question about whether Ramos will be ready for Opening Day, after being away from the team for three days, but his return on Tuesday does make it seem like he will get the start.

8. J.D. Davis, LF – After his outstanding debut campaign in Queens, you could easily make the argument that J.D. Davis belongs much higher up in the lineup. Across his 410 at-bats, Davis hit 22 home runs, 22 doubles and had 57 RBIs. His slugging percentage (.527) and OPS (.895) trailed only Alonso and McNeil and his average (.307) and on-base percentage (.369) were the second-best marks on the team.

With all that being said, my gut feeling is that the Mets will put the veterans ahead of Davis to start the season. But a hot start could catapult Davis back to the top of the lineup in short order.

9. Amed Rosario, SS – Speaking of guys coming off a career-year, the Mets young shortstop put together a fantastic season in 2019 as well. Rosario hit .287/.323/.432, showing steady progression throughout the year, particularly with his defense. Rosario also played in 157 games, which was the second-most behind Alonso.

In years past, a hitter with Rosario’s speed would be a lock to be penciled in atop the lineup. But now on-base percentage is more of a factor into who is the lead-off hitter. With the addition of the DH however, Rosario can be put in the nine-hole, where he will essentially serve as another table-setter for the top of the lineup on their second time through the order.

Jacob deGrom, P – Finally we have the two-time reigning NL Cy Young set to take the mound for another year of Mets baseball. There isn’t much to say about deGrom’s excellence that hasn’t already been said. The best pitcher in baseball will be starting his second-consecutive Opening Day and he won’t even have to worry about batting this time around.