NY Mets Monday Morning GM: The one type of move David Stearns has yet to make

David Stearns joined the New York Mets with his cleanest slate yet. There were core members of the roster leftover from the 2023 sell off. After the 2025 campaign, he scrubbed away some of those pieces and rebuilt a good part of the team, for better or worse. Okay. It was mostly for the worse.

Incredibly already into his fourth offseason with the Mets, there is still one type of move Stearns has yet to make. 

Stearns has obviously sold major league players at the trade deadline. He has even flipped perceived bad contracts. Brandon Nimmo for Marcus Semien was heavily financially motivated as was the dumping of Jeff McNeil. On his Mets transaction log, however, is no trade that clearly intended to upgrade the major league roster at the cost of a major league player.

This offseason doesn't guarantee the Mets buck this trend in the winter

The closest thing, so far, to this type of trade is the Nimmo for Semien swap. That trade always seemed to lean more towards the Texas Rangers getting the greater benefit on the field while the Mets crossed their fingers Semien could return to some level of competency.

The incredibly active 2025-2026 offseason included multiple trades. Along with the McNeil to the Athletics for a prospect deal, the Mets added Freddy Peralta and Luis Robert Jr. While those deals included guys with MLB experience, Brandon Sproat for Peralta and Luisangel Acuna for Robert, the duo barely had enough time served in the majors to meet the criteria of the kind of trade discussed here.

New York hasn’t really been set up for this kind of trade. Anyone else they could have sent outward last offseason would have been more of a salary dump. Kodai Senga was probably the best candidate for this. David Peterson might not have been far behind. The team still has Senga and joining him on the list of trade candidates we can consider are Mark Vientos, Brett Baty, and even Francisco Alvarez. There are other trade candidates, but they are more dumps than moves to actually improve the team immediately.

Need-for-need trades have been rare for the Mets under Stearns when we limit deals to only major league players. Pre-Stearns, we can find some examples.

The Francisco Lindor trade included Amed Rosario and Andres Gimenez going to Cleveland. On a much smaller scale and predating that blockbuster by a few years is the Neil Walker for Jon Niese deal. The organization has been tame in most offseasons when it comes to trades. They’ve, both in the Steve Cohen and prior, chosen the direction of free agents more often than winter swaps.

This isn’t an exclusive trend for the Mets. Many teams choose this route. After last offseason’s trading frenzy which brought New York Peralta, Robert, and Semien in a trio of trades that can be deemed unsuccessful as far as what they got back while ignoring the cost, we should temper our expectations and limit as far as trades go. One major leaguer acquired via trade for another is already a large total.

Based on who the Mets have to trade, we shouldn’t set expectations of breaking this “streak.” Vientos is closer to a non-tender than a desirable trade chip. The Mets have continually shown they’ll move Baty around to fit them. It’s going to take a lot to have them cut Alvarez loose when he still has minor league options and promise. All possible, it just doesn't seem completely viable that we'd see any of those three traded for an immediate need.

The unexpected and unorthodox has been an ordinary part of Stearns’ Mets tenure. So, while not destined,, we can’t completely write-off the possibility.

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