5 reasons the Mets have underachieved under Steve Cohen’s watch

5) Short-term contracts created a never-ending free agent search

The good thing about short-term contracts is you aren’t stuck with an underperforming player for a long time. The bad thing is once the contract is up, the search begins all over again.

The Mets had to get incredibly busy last offseason just to replace their free agents. Jacob deGrom became Justin Verlander. Chris Bassitt and Taijuan Walker became Kodai Senga and Jose Quintana. In the bullpen—well, they didn’t do a very good job at replacing those guys now did they?

This is where the aspect of building up the farm system is important. The Cohen-led Mets are fully aware of this and I do think it’s a model they’ll follow closely throughout his tenure. They get an A in terms of not giving up too much of the future. There have been some big misses in trades in Cohen’s tenure, but they seem to have calmed down as Pete Crow-Armstrong, Endy Rodriguez, and even Josh Winckowski have either thrived in the minors or become big league contributors.

The Mets need a mix of long and short deals with free agents. They actually did a decent job at this in the offseason. Brandon Nimmo will be in Queens forever. Edwin Diaz will stick around a while, too.

Next would be a long-term deal with Pete Alonso. Where the Mets don’t have too many answers is with the starting pitching staff. Hall of Fame mercenaries don’t work. The plan needs to change.