Updated twist in notorious NY Mets trade is Braves schadenfreude at its best

If your aim is to win a congeniality contest, you might be best to refrain from showcasing any examples of your ability to experience schadenfreude. It’s a number one draft pick of German words. Defined as the pleasure derived by someone else’s misfortune, there was a bit of it in the NL East this week as New York Mets fans witnessed one of the franchise’s most notorious trades take a twist.

Just days after 2019 Mets first-round pick Brett Baty was sent to the minors, the 2018 selection saw the same result. Jarred Kelenic had an exhaustive start to the year, batting .167/.231/.300 in 65 plate appearances for the Atlanta Braves. A pair of home runs and only 2 RBI thus far, Atlanta seized their opportunity to add postseason hero Eddie Rosario back on their roster. The counter move was to send Kelenic back to the minor leagues.

You’re not a bad person if you’re enjoying any kind of Braves misfortune, just a really good Mets fan

It was a good day to be a Mets fan on Monday. The team scored 19 runs with Brandon Nimmo driving in a franchise-tying 9 of them for a single game. The team’s left fielder and a first-round pick while Kelenic was dreaming of making his high school team in a few years, the added bonus of seeing Atlanta pull the plug temporarily on the guy who was supposed to ruin our lives does indeed send some pleasure waves down the back of the neck, through the thigh, and all the way to the pinky toe. Nimmo was more productive in one day in D.C. than Kelenic has been all year for the Braves.

Kelenic’s entire big league career has been the subject of scrutiny. First traded by the Mets to the Seattle Mariners ahead of the 2019 campaign for Robinson Cano and Edwin Diaz in a package that has amounted to nothing, the story of this trade was already long ago rewritten after Diaz’s first year in New York. Sure, he has shaky moments. What closer outside of Mariano Rivera doesn’t?

Kelenic heads to the minor leagues with a lifetime .211/.282/.376 slash line in 1488 plate appearances. It seems like enough to start drawing definitive conclusions. Baty, in significantly less time at 660 plate appearances, went down to the minors with a career slash line of .214/.279/.328 at the major league level. Some power out of Kelenic that saw him hit homers in the mid-teens is the only true positive in comparison.

Although he never played a game for the Mets in the majors, there does seem to be a little bit of Mets in him. What do we know best about him? He got injured in Seattle after kicking a water cooler out of frustration. Only a short time ago, he was involved in a controversy when Ronald Acuna Jr. called out a double standard of Kelenic not getting benched for a lack of hustling.

The Braves have managed to crawl back into the NL East race after their miserable start to the season. However, all signs point toward a messy situation. We should, right or wrong morally, enjoy every moment of their dysfunction.