Following the Mets’ introductory press conference for new manager Carlos Beltran, team general manager Brodie Van Wagenen told reporters that the organization is not sure whether outfielder Yoenis Cespedes will play in 2020. Though Van Wagenen added that Cespedes is currently rehabbing from a series of heel and ankle maladies that had cost him the entire 2019 season, he said, “it’s too early to tell… I don’t have enough information to predict when he’s going to be back.”
The news comes as little surprise given how seldom Cespedes has been able to play over the first three years of the four-year, $110MM contract he signed in November of 2016. Between nagging hamstring issues in 2017 and early 2018, a heel surgery that has sidelined him since the late-summer of 2018, and a freak ankle injury that cut his initial rehabilitation short last summer, the Mets have long progressed under an assumption that he would not be a regular contributor. After all, he’s played just 119 games since 2017, albeit hitting .282/.343/.525 with 26 homers, 71 RBI, and a 132 OPS+.
It’s still sobering, however, to know he may not even remotely factor into such a pivotal year both in his career and the general trajectory of the organization, especially considering how mightily he contributed to the team’s last two playoff runs in 2015 and 2016. In those first 188 games, Cespedes hit 48 home runs while driving in 130 and posting a .903 OPS as the team’s leading offensive threat.
The last known report on Cespedes during the regular season came in June courtesy of Bleacher Report‘s Bob Klapisch, who wrote that the organization was considering a means of voiding the remainder of the outfielder’s contract following the ankle fractures that he sustained on his ranch. Michael McCann of Sports Illustrated also theorized ways in which such a buyout could be achieved, citing violations of the club’s insurance policy. Though no traction has followed this news, it isn’t out of the realm of possibility to suspect that Cespedes’ lack of availability in 2020 could have more to do with his state in the organization than his physical health.
