New York Mets utility player Jeff McNeil expects the team to end their postseason drought when October rolls around.
Last year, the New York Mets ended the regular season as one of the hottest teams in baseball despite not reaching the playoffs. They finished in third place in the National League East division with a record of 86-76. This came after they found themselves 11 games under-.500 at one point.
Nonetheless, a playoff berth is a playoff berth, and the Mets missed out on one for the third consecutive year.
But in 2020, the team will have a great deal of potential and possesses much momentum from their strong 2019 finish. Because of all this, utility player Jeff McNeil believes the team will be able to go the extra mile and play October baseball.
“I think we have really high expectations,” McNeil said on SiriusXM’s MLB Network Radio, per Coby Green of SNY. “I expect to make the playoffs, you know, we came up a little short last year but I expect to make the playoffs. We got the pitching staff to do it. We got the best pitcher in baseball in [Jacob] deGrom. We got Pete [Alonso]. We’ve got a bunch of young guys, we’ve got a good mix of young guys and veterans, so I think we’re just going to build off what we did last year.
“We had a good second half, I think we had one of the best records in baseball in the second half, so just kind of build on that and hopefully once we get in the playoffs anything can happen, especially with our pitching staff with deGrom, [Noah] Syndergaard, it’s a pretty good top of the rotation. Basically we just have to get to the playoffs and go from there.”
McNeil emerged as one of the ballclub’s more productive players last year. In his first full season in the majors, the All-Star hit 23 home runs with 75 RBIs and a slash line of .318/.384/.531. His batting average was the sixth-best in the entire major leagues.
It’s unclear where McNeil will play in the field in 2020. But one of the great things about him is that he can play almost anywhere. Last year, McNeil spent time in left field, right field, and at both second and third base.
