What’s up with the Mets? ⚾️
The lost to the Nationals on the final day of the regular season by a score of 6-4 (box)
LHP Sean Manaea started for the Mets and had a disappointing day - he coughed up a 4-1 lead and ultimately allowed five runs over six innings
SS Francisco Lindor finally broke through with his 300th career home run - he is the only shortstop in MLB history to record 300 home runs and 200 stolen bases and his 300 home runs are the seventh-most in MLB history among Puerto Rican born players
OF Carson Benge had a three-hit day, and INF Ronny Mauricio homered again as part of a two-hit day
The Mets finished in last place in the NL East for the first time since 2003, and their 74 wins was their lowest mark since 2017, although they went 34-31 in the second half of the season and 40-41 since Andy Green took over as manager in late June
Roster Moves 📰
RHP Jonathan Pintaro placed on the 15-Day Injured List with an illness
LHP Jefry Yan recalled from FCL Mets
Play of the Game ⭐️
Francisco Lindor had gone homerless over his last 13 games, but on Sunday, he finally broke through, cracking his 300th career home run to left field.
292 of his 300 home runs have come as a shortstop, which is tied with Miguel Tejada for third-most in MLB history.
The Just Mets Podcast 🎙️
On the latest edition of the Just Mets Podcast, Rich and Andrew recapped the final week of the season for the Mets and previewed the uncertain off-season ahead for the Mets.
SUBSCRIBE: YouTube | Apple Podcasts | Spotify
NL Rookie of the Year race 🏆
Carson Benge’s 4.3 fWAR was the second-highest among National League position player rookies in 2026, 0.2 points behind JJ Wetherholt. Wetherholt had missed a couple of weeks but was recently activated from the injured list:
Meanwhile, Nolan McLean leads all National League pitchers by a significant margin with a 3.5 fWAR:
With a ton of work to do, the Mets may have found their North Star ✍️
Well, it’s finally over. It’s actually been over for a few months now, but another sour season for the Mets is finally behind us.
But while the Mets went 74-88 this year and finished in last place with nearly 90 losses, there’s a lot of good that happened over the final three months that record will not appreciate.
Now, I am not going to pretend what transpired in 2026 generally was good, and sitting here in another season where it seems almost harder to not make the playoffs than it does (just ask the Phillies, who did everything possible over the final week to go home on Sunday), but it’s not as if the Mets are going home for the winter staring into the dark abyss.
If you had asked me July 4 what I thought things might look like over the next few years, I might have sung a different tune for you. After all, the Mets were 36-53 on that date and had just lost for the 12th time in their last 14 games. Yeah, Andy Green had been at the helm for about a week by then, but the Mets were a walking disaster in a season that had gone horribly, but not necessarily surprisingly, wrong.
But by then, Bo Bichette had righted a seriously concerning first couple of months of his season, Nolan McLean had made his mid-season adjustment on the mound, Carson Benge and AJ Ewing were putting on clinics in the outfield, and between that and Green’s reboot on the roster, there was a different vibe with the club, even if it didn’t seem that way on the field.
And, over time, the results on the field began to change for this team even as the Mets began to unload their roster ahead of the trade deadline. It was too late to turn the season around for sure even as the Mets began to play better in July, but perhaps the beginning of turning this franchise around after basically a full year of terribleness.
I do wonder if this group began to play well after the All-Star Game once they actually realized the season had gotten away from them and the front office decided to cash out on their expiring contracts. I don’t necessarily think that’s a good thing even as the results improved because ultimately, seasons are defined by a club’s ability to perform under pressure and in its biggest moments, and the Mets have failed to do that time and time again over the course of 2025 and 2026.
But, in the end, it would be unfair to dismiss what transpired over the season’s final 81 games under Green, who unquestionably deserves credit for at least picking up the pieces from a broken team, identifying those pieces which were fixable, changing the tone and tenor of a lost season and re-steering the franchise back on a path where there is at least some valid hope going forward.
When I take the 30,000-foot view on the Mets on the day when there’s the most distance in between games that count, I can’t help but look at McLean, Ewing, Benge, Jonah Tong, Zac Thornton specifically and the suddenly top-heavy part of their minor leagues and be excited for what’s ahead. I don’t think it’s fair to expect all of it to work out over time— it never does for any team. But, the Mets have at least positioned themselves strategically to feed their major league roster with premium young talent over the next few seasons, which is the true key to building championships.
Perhaps this front office found their North Star.
Yes, they need to roll out the red carpet for Tarik Skubal. They have albatrosses on their roster in Sean Manaea and Marcus Semien. Bichette potentially holds the key to their entire off-season and how they proceed with finding infielders - what is he going to do with his opt out? They have to decide among Nate Lavender, Daniel Duarte, Jefry Yan, Dedniel Núñez, Jonathan Pintaro who will be parts of their next bullpen, and figure out how Devin Williams and Kodai Senga fit as well (if the latter fits at all).
These are all critical questions that must be examined and answered, and perhaps quickly with the collective bargaining agreement expiring on December 1. Will there even be a Winter Meetings? Will there be a signing bonanza like there was before the last CBA expired in 2021? And, how many games will this next bargaining process cost Major League Baseball?
All of that plays into the calculus for the Mets, who need to take the progress of the last 81 games of the 2026 season and translate that into contending again in 2027, or whenever they play again.
Of course, there’s that and then there’s the under-discussed issue with Francisco Lindor and Juan Soto in 2026.
No, I am not talking about their past clubhouse problems, which both of them and Steve Cohen insist are in the rearview mirror.
I am talking about the combined 108 games they missed in 2026 due to calf injuries, and Lindor specifically who came into camp in early February with a messed-up hamate bone and never actually got his season right on either side of the ball.
For Soto, it’s probably less worrisome because he’s 27. He has been very hard on himself lately because of the calf injuries and has vowed to put a focus on his lower half this winter in an effort to stay healthier and on the field. The Mets went 54-57 with Soto this year, 20-31 without him.
But, Lindor will be entering his age-33 season in 2027. The hamate bone situation in February unquestionably derailed his season, and while it was expected his power might be absent for a while once he got back, he pulled up lame with a calf injury that cost him two months of the season in late April, which messed him up even more, and things just never were totally right for him offensively or defensively.
I do think 2027 will be better for Lindor, but even he acknowledged after Sunday’s game he needs to work on his strength this winter. Perhaps that’s an acknowledgment about his overall preparation for 2026, perhaps that’s an acknowledgment that he isn’t getting any younger and he has to train differently and smarter at this stage of his career, or perhaps it’s a bit of both. Either way, we all know that as a player gets older, especially one who plays at a premium position, their performance changes. It’s not something the Mets can do a lot about today, but the Mets might need to consider a different rest and recovery plan for Lindor going forward and maybe have him DH more while getting him more off-days.
We will see how that ultimately transpires, but I am pretty sure that while the Mets won’t acknowledge any of that publicly, they’ll consider a different playing map for Lindor to keep him healthier and fresher in future seasons.
No matter what they do this winter, the Mets cannot have both Lindor and Soto absent from the field for so much time. The team cannot function without them being healthy and productive.
We have plenty of time to discuss all of these good things and bad things over the next month or so during the playoffs. For now, we can sit back, reflect, and just rest our brains on what was nothing short of a tiring season which proved fruitless once again.
Around the League 🚩
The Phillies snuck into the playoffs on the last day of the season, eliminating the Diamondbacks from the Wild Card race with a 7-3 win over the Rays
The Astros routed the A’s 9-0 to win the American League West and eliminating the Rangers
RHP Max Scherzer won what could have been his final start of his career as the Blue Jays cruised to a 5-1 win over the Reds
The Mariners beat the Angels 7-3, which was Los Angeles’s 100th loss of the season
The Dodgers won their 100th game of the season in a bullpen game against the Giants, who lost 97 games in 2026
Although their 162nd game was canceled due to rain, Pete Alonso became the first player in MLB history to win an RBI title in both the AL and the NL
You nailed it, Drew. Rarely has a Mets season ended below .500 with me feeling this optimistic—and actually eager for spring training.
Maybe I saw a few green shoots in 1968. Certainly in 2014. But it doesn’t happen often.
This group gave me hope.
Somewhere during the summer, the Mets went from a team I occasionally invented reasons not to watch to one I wanted to see every night. Young players emerged. Young pitchers made you sit up a little straighter. Losing games stopped feeling like evidence of hopelessness and started feeling like part of building something.
There are plenty of winter questions. They need a front-line starter. What do you do with the albatross contracts? Whither Baty, Alvarez and Vientos? Who stays? Who gets thanked for his service and pointed toward the exit?
But baseball rebuilds get awfully interesting when you start with good young pitching.
For the first time in a while, I look at this Mets team and believe there are more good days ahead than bad ones.
See you in Port St. Lucie.