2 reasons the Mets will be a competitive team in 2024, 2 reasons they won’t

The NY Mets won’t be competitive in 2024 because while not starting from scratch they do need some major changes

The Mets can get lucky and grow a few relievers, sign a guy off the scrap heap who becomes awesome, and find themselves with one of the better bullpens in baseball. Equally, they can crash and burn once again because of their lack of quality bullpen arms. Everything in between is always a possibility, too.

Too many changes for the roster need to happen before the start of the 2024 season. The team simply doesn’t have enough warm bodies to fill out the 26-man roster who look big league-ready.

We can cite this as one of the reasons as to why the 2023 Mets struggled so much. Three starting pitchers hit free agency. Even more relievers hit the open market. It doesn’t matter how much money is thrown at free agents. You’re going to miss on a couple no matter how pricy they are or how much scouting is done. Unforeseen circumstances always tend to pop up.

An entire change to the roster isn’t needed, but the starting rotation needs some major additions and perhaps a little bit of luck. The offense has some holes in it, too. The team has to account for the possibility of more season-long slumps. The Mets just don’t have enough firepower in their starting nine right now or ready for next season to scare too many teams.

Next year’s Mets will be short of perfection either due to missing parts on the roster or an abundance of guys playing below expectations. The front office seems fully aware that they are incapable of accomplishing the goal of turning the current club into a no-doubt contender for next season. The under-promising and over-delivering approach could be what we get from them. The apparent self-awareness, while it won’t lead to contending, will at least signal promising days thereafter.