NY Mets Monday Morning GM: Trade deadline failures made a bad team worse

Where did it all go wrong for the New York Mets? Was it the moment when Kodai Senga went down with an injury in the middle of a game on June 12? Was it when they brought Alex Carrillo in as their first reliever of the second half and let him get pounded for far too long? There isn’t a singular moment where we can directly point and say that was the declarative second the Mets were about to go down the toilet.

The MLB trade deadline results certainly deserve blame. Individual performances are easy to measure and question. What’s easy to forget is how well-positioned the Mets were on July 31.

At 62-47 on July 31, they had just a half-game lead over the Philadelphia Phillies. The Milwaukee Brewers were 64-44 with the Chicago Cubs and Los Angeles Dodgers not far behind them but slightly better than the Mets. All 7 of the best teams in the National League at the time decided to be trade deadline buyers. The Mets were the ones left behind.

The Mets got left behind and overtaken by the other NL contenders at the trade deadline

Ryan Helsley blowing three games against three different opponents in three consecutive appearances in mid-August defined the trade deadline’s misgivings better than anything else. He was the one impact player we thought was the surest thing. Gregory Soto was only going to be their second lefty and more of an option to matchup against left-handed batters with the higher leverage spots left up to Brooks Raley.

Tyler Rogers had an okay stint with the Mets with his regular availability being the most useful part of his game. He was pretty much what we could’ve expected him to be. He could’ve reduced the number of inherited runners he allowed to score. Of the 8 handed off to him, 5 crossed the plate including another on Sunday. His time with the San Francisco Giants included 2 out of 7 scoring.

Then there’s Cedric Mullins whose presence on the Mets almost became unnecessary if not for the injury to Tyrone Taylor. Focus on July 31 involved who the Mets would add to their center field mix with Luis Robert Jr. being the hottest name. Instead, the Mets went with Mullins whose stock had fallen. By the time the Mets did trade for him, the Baltimore Orioles didn’t have too many other suitors. It went as badly as the doubters went.

The foursome didn’t exclusively cause the Mets to miss the playoffs. They failed to add starting pitchers from outside the organization. Nolan McLean rode in on a white horse after the village was already burning.

It came down to the final game of the season and yet the team was sinking much sooner than the finale and even the trade deadline. June 13 is referenced as the day when the team transitioned from the best in the National League to whatever they transformed into for the rest of the year. The trade deadline was their opportunity to get right. They only continued to get worse.