The New York Mets’ 2018 season is all but over, but there is plenty to play for with regard to the following five players.
It’s been known for a while now that the New York Mets would be missing the postseason for a second consecutive year. We have also been anticipating them on being sellers prior to the non-waiver trade deadline.
Well, one shoe has finally fallen for the National League East’s last-place team in the days following the All-Star break — closer Jeurys Familia has traded in his blue and orange for green and gold as the Oakland Athletics chase a wild-card berth.
There’s not much for manager Mickey Callaway’s club to play for this season, other than pride and to spoil the postseason aspirations of other contenders. However, the final 60-plus regular season games will be important for a number of players on the roster.
The majority (if not all) of them are expected to be part of New York’s future, but how things go over the ensuing months could determine exactly how much.
Noah Syndergaard
Whoa, whoa, whoa, Noah Syndergaard is a stud, right? After all, he’s still mentioned as one of the team’s co-aces with Jacob deGrom (although his teammate is head-and-shoulders above him in performance). Yes, that’s all true, but the man needs to toe the slab every five days for a few months.
The hard-throwing right-hander has thrown just 105 innings since the start of 2017 due to various ailments, like a torn lat and a strained ligament in his right index finger. His results have been stellar when he does pitch — he owns a 2.91 ERA, 3.08 SIERA, 26.7 percent strikeout rate, and 4.1 percent walk rate during that time.
Still, it’s hard to know how other teams truly value him (or how valuable he actually is to the Mets) unless he can stay healthy. Things didn’t get any easier Friday against the New York Yankees, either.
In just his second start since May 25, Syndergaard allowed one run on eight hits, no walks, and four strikeouts in five innings of work. That part was cool. The uncool part was the drop in velocity toward the end of his outing. The not cool part is him returning to the disabled list with hand, foot, and mouth disease.
He’s expected to miss just seven to 10 days, but in Metsian, that’s about two months. So we’ll see exactly how much time he misses and if he’s still able to put together a strong finish to the year.
NEXT: Players 2 & 3
Brandon Nimmo
When talking about the Mets’ offense from the first half, outfielder Brandon Nimmo was just about the only bright spot in the lineup. His play has taken him from being a fourth, or even fifth outfielder due to the presence of Juan Lagares and Jay Bruce, to being firmly planted as an every-day player moving forward.
There isn’t just one metric that’s encouraging when looking at what Nimmo has accomplished thus far in 2018 — there’s plenty. The goal for the remainder of this season, similar to teammate Amed Rosario, is to sustain his level of play to a degree.
Entering Monday’s game, Nimmo’s monthly OPS (1.051, .984, .833, .609) and monthly wRC+ (191, 168, 128, 73) have been consistently worsening. This is partly due to the simple fact that he’s finally getting regular playing time. His 321 plate appearances are already more than he racked up in the two prior seasons combined (295).
There’s going to be some bumps in the road and adjusting going on throughout what’s basically his first full season in the big leagues. He’s clearly shown what he’s capable of, but with a potential roster logjam in the outfield in the near future, Nimmo needs to continue proving he’s worth the starting job without a shadow of a doubt.
Robert Gsellman
A starter for the majority of his big-league career, Robert Gsellman has been used exclusively out of the bullpen in 2018. The overall results have been merely meh — he owns a 4.15 ERA and 3.88 SIERA with a 21.4 percent strikeout rate and 9.5 percent walk rate — but the early results were much better.
Through his first 15 innings, he was the proud owner of a sparkling 1.80 ERA and 30.2 percent strikeout rate. Since May 1, a period which spans 41.1 innings, those numbers have worsened to 5.01 and 18.3 percent, respectively.
His workload in this new role has also been rather burdensome. Not only is Gsellman among the top 30 in appearances (44), but he’s also among the top five in innings pitched (56.1). Although there’s no room in the rotation at the moment (unless someone gets traded, *cough* Zack Wheeler *cough*), Seth Lugo has a much better chance at earning that spot.
It’s also worth noting that Gsellman is one of the few relievers Callaway seems to have confidence in with regard to his bullpen. However, he’s had a hard time keeping opposing teams off the board.
Over his last 12 appearances (since June 20), the right-hander has allowed at least one run nine times (earned runs on seven occasions). If he’s actually going to be part of the Mets’ future, some of that consistency from April needs to be present.
NEXT: Players 4 & 5
Michael Conforto
After a terrific 2017 campaign that ended in a tough-looking shoulder surgery, Michael Conforto’s quick return to the lineup in April was encouraging. So was his homer off Stephen Strasburg in his season debut.
The rest hasn’t been all sunshine and rainbows, though.
Viewed as a crucial piece to this lineup being successful, Conforto has struggled to a .221/.346/.381 triple slash with 12 homers and 34 RBI through 355 plate appearances.
One apparent issue in 2018 is his performance against right-handed pitching. His 104 wRC+ in that situation is propped up by a 17.3 percent walk rate, but it still doesn’t help his .211/.358/.368 triple slash very much. For reference, Conforto posted a 164 wRC+ with a .303/.417/.595 triple slash against righties in 2017.
There is some progress with regard to his quality of contact when looking at his monthly progression. After failing to post a hard-hit rate above 30.0 percent in April and May, it’s been above 40.0 percent since the start of June.
While the rest of his batted-ball profile could be better, his BABIP has decreased as the year’s progressed (just over .300 over the first two months, around .230 since).
There’s no way the Mets would give up on Conforto at this point in his career — especially since there’s no solid precedent for a return from his injury. However, seeing some results over the final few months of the regular season will help him build some momentum into 2019.
Steven Matz
We’ve already covered how good Steven Matz has been this year since a rough start in April. The southpaw has been so good, in fact, that he’s found his name in the rumor mill with the non-waiver trade deadline approaching.
It seems as if New York is valuing Matz as a front-end starter instead of what he’s typically been throughout his career: an oft-injured middle-of-the-rotation arm.
Outside of his recent stellar performance, his contract situation is an especially intriguing draw for opposing teams. After all, he’s making just $577,000 this season, will be entering arbitration for the first time this winter and is under team control through 2021.
Matz’s first full season in the big leagues was 2016, and he still hasn’t surpassed 22 starts or 132.1 innings in any campaign. There’s a decent chance he’ll finally get past those benchmarks this year, but it still needs to actually happen.
Plus, while his 3.65 ERA is great to look at, his 4.35 SIERA tells us he has run into some good fortune so far.
Is Matz talented? Yes. Has he shown flashes of being an above-average starter? Yes. Has he also shown a propensity for completely falling apart at a moment’s notice? You bet. He’s gotten better at staying composed, but that’s still something to consider.
Similar to Syndergaard — minus the whole weird disease stuff, of course — he needs to not only sustain his current performance, but also just simply stay on the mound from here on out.