New York Mets: What needs to happen to win big in 2020

Catcher

After watching Wilson Ramos’ dreadful defensive year in 2019, I do hope he has worked hard over the winter, working on his glovework and release time when throwing to second and third base. In my 36 years of watching baseball, I have never seen a professional catcher turn so many strikes into balls, due to allowing the pitch move his glove from in the strike zone to out of the strike zone.

Granted, the Mets have some of the hardest throwers in the league with Jacob deGrom, Noah Syndergaard, and Edwin Diaz, but he is a professional catcher and needs to keep that glove in the strike zone regardless of how hard the pitch is.

One way the Mets can improve their catcher defense is to keep Tomas Nido as the backup catcher in 2020. Nido was excellent in all aspects defensively behind the plate and did show a great connection with both Jacob deGrom and Noah Syndergaard. I think it makes too much sense to allow Nido to become the personal catcher for both pitchers.

Yes, Nido didn’t have a strong year at the plate, but his at-bats did seem to improve as the 2019 season progressed. With the Mets projected to have many strong hitters batting one through seven in the lineup, they can afford to lose some offense to improve the defense behind the plate for three out of the seven days of the week.

Compared to 2019, I hope to see less Ramos and more Nido in 2020.

First Base

It has been a very long time since I had the pleasure to watch the type of power that was displayed by the Polar Bear Pete Alonso in 2019. He brought back memories of early 1980s Dave Kingman, mid to late 1980’s Darryl Strawberry with a little mid-1990s Todd Hundley mix in there.

Hopefully, Alonso can avoid the sophomore jinx and look to build on his successes of 2019.

Personally, I don’t think he will let all the success go to his head (ala Matt Harvey) and do believe he will work extremely hard to keep improving his game on both sides of the ball. It is hard to say he needs to improve as a hitter, but a couple of things I noticed in 2019 was he needs to have a better understanding of when to use a two-strike approach so he can make some more contact when the situation calls for a single instead of a home run.

On the defensive side of the ball, I was surprised how good he was with the glove. All we heard in 2018 was that Alonso was a horrible defensive first baseman and was the reason why he didn’t get a September call up. I was expecting someone the likes of Jason Giambi, but at this point, he is already proven to be a far superior defensive player than Giambi ever was.

That being said he can still look to improve his scooping skills a bit and I do think he does have a chance to win a gold glove in the future.

Second Base

It is extremely frustrating that we have a Gold Glove, All-Star-caliber second baseman on the roster, who unfortunately will be playing third base in 2020. I kind of understand having to take on Robinson Cano and his $96,000,000 over the next four seasons in order to get Edwin Diaz last winter.

Diaz was so dominant in 2018 and I was very excited to bring him on board. But between Mickey Callaway’s misuse and Diaz’s inability to handle the New York pressure, we all saw how that trade turned out in 2019. I will talk more about that when I get to discussing the bullpen.

Back to second base, I do hope that Robinson Cano can prove in 2020 that his career is not tainted by his 2018 PED suspension, can stay healthy and productive for the entire season, and maybe show a little more hustle running the bases.

All that being said, I still don’t understand why second base has been such a problem position historically for the Mets. It doesn’t help that we continue to bring in players way past their prime to play the position, in hopes that they are going to produce as they did while still in their prime (ala Roberto Alomar and Carlos Baerga).

Shortstop

It is time for Amed Rosario to hit the classroom, the baseball classroom. The man has all the tools needed to be one of the best shortstops in the game but seems to lack the baseball IQ to put all the tools together and go from a promising player to a great player.

So what can he do to get to that next level?

First, he needs to learn to more closely study the hitters of the National League. For someone with so much raw speed, he should have plus range and be able to cover from deep in the shortstop hole to past the second base bag on the first base side.

But based on my observations from the last couple of years, too many ground balls just get past his glove and roll into the outfield. He seems to always get a late jump on the ball off the bat.

This must drive the pitchers crazy and I think learning more about the hitters’ tendencies and having better defensive placement should help with this problem. It is crazy to think that a player like Derek Jeter, who had limited range and less speed, seemed to cover more ground than Rosario.

On the offensive side of the ball, Rosario needs to significantly improve his plate discipline. I am not saying he needs to walk 100 times, but there are still too many at-bats where he looks completely lost at the plate and strikes out on three bad pitches out of the strike zone.

Looking at his 2019 stats, someone with Rosario’s speed should be able to steal 25 plus bases and score 100 runs with his eyes closed. He didn’t do either and in 2019 Rosario did not even score 80 runs and led the league in caught stealing. If he can improve in both of those areas, he can really add another dimension to the Mets offense.

Third Base

With the fundamentally sound Jeff McNeil penciled in to be the everyday third baseman in 2020, all I will say here is that we need The Flying Squirrel to stay healthy for the entire season. If he does, I do see good things in his future, including an All-Star appearance and possibly a gold glove.

One other item for the hot corner, is I do hope that J.D. Davis continues to practice and improve his defense at third base.

When McNeil eventually takes over at second base in the future, Davis can step into the everyday third base role. I think with some hard work and more experience he can make himself a serviceable player at third base.

Outfield

At this current moment, it does look like we will go into the 2020 season with a four-man outfield rotation of J.D. Davis, Brandon Nimmo, Jake Marisnick, and Michael Conforto. I’ll get to that other guy shortly.

Personally, I do believe this rotation will succeed and if Nimmo can stay healthy for the entire season and continue getting on-base at a .400 clip, I do see this outfield mix being extremely productive offensively and good enough defensively with the addition of Marisnick. We do still need a fifth outfielder, and as I mentioned in my low-end free agent article, I do recommend the Mets to bring in a Billy Hamilton type to not only give us another plus defender in the outfield, but also someone who can pinch-run and steal a base at will.

The one problem I do possibly see, has to do with an amateur rancher who had an incident with a wild boar. Yes, the worst thing that could happen to this 2020 outfield mix is for Yoenis Cespedes to start taking at-bats away from core guys Davis and Nimmo. After proving that he didn’t care to try and live up to his $29,000,000 per year contract and made the bad decision to partake in activities that would hinder his recovery from the injured list, he should NOT be given the chance to mess up the 2020 outfield rotation.

Now with his contract being reduced (personally I would have voided it), I believe Cespedes should be sent back to his ranch to sit out the season, or traded to another team for a bag of baseballs to be cancer in another team’s clubhouse. Yes, I have heard many Mets fans tell me since he is playing for a new contract he will be motivated and productive, but keep in mind that the Mets still play in the National League that doesn’t use the DH, and he will still have to play the outfield on two broken wheels. I think Cespedes is now officially a DH only type of player.

Starting Pitching

With the starting pitching being our biggest strength of our team, the health of our starters becomes the biggest factor in 2020. Some other items:

Jacob deGrom needs to be his usual consistent self and win 15 plus games (with hopefully some more run support).

Noah Syndergaard needs to continue his evolution from a thrower to a pitcher and also win 15 plus games. If we make the smart decision to use Nido as his personal catcher, Thor won’t allow as many stolen bases which seems to be his kryptonite.

Marcus Stroman needs to believe in his defense, stop nibbling with two strikes and realize that his not a strikeout pitcher. He needs to go back to pitching to soft contact as he did in his Toronto days and win 15 plus games.

A combination of Michael Wacha, Rick Porcello, and Steven Matz need to give the team 400 plus combined innings so we don’t have to overuse the bullpen.

It is nice that we finally have some starting pitching depth in 2020, so we don’t have to depend on AAAA guys like we did in 2019.

Bullpen

Our biggest weakness in 2019, needs to turn into a strength in 2020. Without Mickey Callaway around to misuse the bullpen, I do believe that pitchers Edwin Diaz and Jeurys Familia will both have bounce-back years in 2020 and lead the Mets into the playoffs.

The addition of Christmas present Dellin Betances adds much-needed depth to the bullpen, so hopefully, the rest of the pen doesn’t need to pitch on back to back days too often. I do think we still need another lefty to go along with Justin Wilson and if Wacha and Porcello do their jobs that 2nd lefty role may eventually go to Steven Matz.

Also, if Wilson, Matz, Brad Brach, and Robert Gsellman can all do their jobs as reliable bullpen pieces, it may allow Seth Lugo to go back into the starting rotation. I am well aware that Lugo was our best reliever last year, but he has stated pretty strongly that he wants to go back to being a starter and he does have the arsenal of pitches to be an effective starter in the major leagues.

That is a good problem to have and let’s see how that plays out during spring training and during the regular season. Whether Lugo is a starter, reliever or a little of both, I believe he should continue to provide solid innings as he did in 2019.

If the stars and planets align, everything breaks right and we don’t have to deal with many injuries, I do think the 2020 Mets can improve on their 86-76 record from 2019. But with the National League East looking to be the best division in baseball, we will need to improve by at least six wins and get our record to at least 92-70 to either win the division or make the playoffs as one of the two Wild Cards.

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Regardless of what happens, I can’t wait for the 2020 season to start so I can watch my favorite team play the greatest game in the history of sports on a daily basis.