The rest of the sport keeps trying to play matchmaker between the Mets and Cubs. Talk to an executive about the Mets’ search for hitting or the Cubs’ hunt for pitching and inevitably you get some version of, “If you have any reason why these teams should not be united in trade, speak now or forever hold your peace.”
It makes sense, of course. The Mets have stockpiled young pitching, the Cubs young hitting. Each needs what the other has.
“A mirror image of each other,” an NL executive said.
They have talked before and will again this offseason. Yet, so far, neither wants to surrender its stronghold. In an age of decreased offense, the Cubs’ theory is he who has the most prime-aged quality hitters is king.
Also, the Cubs see avenues to rotation help without touching the hitters. Their pitching coach, Chris Bosio, has shown an ability to resurrect careers (Ryan Dempster, Scott Feldman, Jason Hammel, Jake Arrieta). Plus with so many cost-effective young hitters such as Arismendy Alcantara, Javier Baez, Kris Bryant, Addison Russell, Jorge Soler, etc., Chicago can use its money to buy pitching. Key members of the front office, for example, have long-standing relationships with Jon Lester, a free agent this coming offseason, and David Price, a free agent after 2015.
This is another way the Cubs have been like the Mets — at present, they are a huge-market team masquerading as paupers.
However, even if the Mets open their wallets to address offensive deficiencies, the free-agent market is not as rich in high-end hitters as it is in starting pitching. Do the Mets want to, for example, dabble in multi-year deals with Biogenesis graduates such as Melky Cabrera or Nelson Cruz, or give injury-prone Hanley Ramirez a long-term pact, though pretty much the entire sport believes he no longer can handle shortstop and should move to third?
And the Mets already have a highly paid third baseman and the offensive plummet of Wright — and Curtis Granderson — will subdue an already reticent ownership from digging deep to do more big deals.
Which brings us back around to trades and why matching the Mets and Cubs in our imagination happens so frequently. Would you trade Zack Wheeler for Starlin Castro? Noah Syndergaard for Russell?
Except the Mets — like the Cubs — do not seem in the mode or the mood to trade youngsters. An NL executive described the Mets this way: “They don’t make a lot of trades and that is because they really don’t like to give up what they perceive as their big talent, unless they can convince you to give them $2 for their 35 cents.”
Strategically, general manager Sandy Alderson also is concerned how quickly you can go from too much to not enough pitching. Jacob deGrom’s shoulder hurts, Jeremy Hefner suffers a serious regression in his return from Tommy John surgery, Jon Niese’s shoulder is always worrisome and Matt Harvey continues to rehab from his elbow operation. And the general tenor of the sport this year has shown just how fragile pitchers are.
Which, by the way, is why the Mets would have to give up more than just a pitcher — no matter how talented Wheeler or Syndergaard is — to get a Cubs shortstop. And this is with the Mets concerned about those shortstops. There will be big-time pressure to win in 2015, and do the Mets want to go through growing pains with someone such as Russell?
They worry about Castro’s defensive flightiness. But, for the record, I am a fan of the player. Though this is his fifth season, Castro, whose ninth-inning homer on Sunday against the Mets was the game winner, is a year younger than Harvey and just two months older than Wheeler. He is extremely durable, something that can’t be said about more expensive shortstops who could be on the market — Jose Reyes and Troy Tulowitzki, whose hip surgery makes him borderline untradeable. Castro’s .766 OPS is third among qualified shortstops, but the two guys ahead of him — Ramirez and Jhonny Peralta — are going to have to move to third soon.
Nevertheless, the sense I get currently from the Mets is they would like to protect Harvey, Syndergaard and probably Wheeler and use other elements to solve positional problems. So I could see the Mets shooting a little lower on the shortstop food chain by trying to use Dillon Gee, Niese, Sunday’s starter Rafael Montero or others from their deep trove to see if they could get, say, the White Sox’s Alexei Ramirez or try for an Arizona shortstop — the Diamondbacks seem much more willing to talk Didi Gregorius than Chris Owings, but while a defensive whiz, Gregorius might not project to hit enough for the Mets.
The lack of quality available inventory at shortstop ultimately could push the Mets even more toward the Cubs, who have Castro, Russell and Javier Baez. The matchmakers just might ultimately have it right.