2 ways the NY Mets bullpen has gotten better, 1 way it got worse

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What frustrates a baseball team more than a bullpen? Outside of some miracle seasons where every reliever seems to find his groove, the relief corps tends to cause the most agitation in fans. New York Mets fans have experienced this plenty. Even some of the franchise’s greatest closers have had years where it looked like they didn’t belong on a big league roster.

Building a bullpen is one of the more difficult tasks for a general manager. Billy Eppler has retained and added to the team’s relief corps this offseason. In two ways it looks better and in another it already looks worse.

The NY Mets bullpen got better with the addition of Brooks Raley

There is little denying the one improvement we all expect to see is going from Joely Rodriguez to Brooks Raley. Rodriguez was bad enough at times last year that some Mets fans might believe asking a righty to throw with his left arm would be an improvement. Billy Wagner is excluded from this non-existent challenge.

Raley comes to the Mets team desperate to get more from a lefty reliever. He’s coming off of a successful year with the Tampa Bay Rays that included a 2.68 ERA in 53.2 innings of work. He’s now in a more traditional bullpen than their crafty ways of constructing relievers. He’s not going to save 6 games for the Mets this season as he did for Tampa Bay in 2022.

Mets fans got used to seeing lefties join the roster from the outside and become important pieces. Aaron Loup, Justin Wilson, and Jerry Blevins many more years ago became essential. Is Raley going to follow in their footsteps?

The NY Mets bullpen got better by improving the minor league depth

The Mets successfully added a whole bunch of minor league arms this offseason. Through waivers, free agent signings, and a couple of trades, the team now has a bunch of optional options with an opportunity to operate regularly and sway our opinions toward optimism. That’s what the optics say.

Pitching depth continues to grow in its importance. We know it takes more than five starting pitchers to get through a season. Relief pitchers are added to the Opening Day roster with a plan of eventually demoting them in order to get a fresher arm. It’s the way of the game right now.

The Mets have a mix of players like John Curtiss and Stephen Ridings who are coming off of an injury. They’re younger than some of the other journeymen relievers out there, even those Billy Eppler brought into the equation.

Tommy Hunter is back and stashed on the farm with no minor league options left. The team threw a Hail Mary by signing lefty veteran T.J. McFarland. He’ll only have his roster spot glass broken in case of emergency. Maybe they find gold on the other side.

Refusing to settle to have David Peterson or Tylor Megill in the rotation adds even more important depth. While they may not get any relief innings early on, both would be late-season contenders to slot into the bullpen as needed.

The NY Mets bullpen got worse by relying on that depth for several roster spots

As much as we can praise the team for adding a lot of depth, they are suddenly relying on at least two of those arms to be consistent. Not all of the players in their crop of relievers are going to begin the year in Syracuse. Two or maybe even three are going to join the club on Opening Day.

The Mets are putting a lot of faith in finding a gem from their pack of Four-A pitchers. They’re planning for Elieser Hernandez or Jeff Bringham to be better than they’ve been in the past. The club will need Rule 5 Draft pick Zach Greene to become “the one who got away” in the eyes of New York Yankees fans this year.

Barring another addition, the season will begin with a bullpen that looks like a piece is missing. Edwin Diaz, Adam Ottavino, David Robertson, Brooks Raley, and Drew Smith are the five we’d bet give Buck Showalter quality innings. The other three spots are kind of open. It will make for a good spring battle, however, it does feel like the team could get caught scrambling to find who should stick around longer.

If all goes well for the Mets, having five very good relievers should be enough. Compared to last season’s planned bullpen, it does feel weaker at the moment.

Diaz, Ottavino, and Smith are returning. Raley is an upgrade over Joely Rodriguez. We can say Robertson has replaced Trevor May or Seth Lugo. The Trevor Williams spot in the bullpen and on the roster itself will have to be filled by a combination of Elieser Hernandez, Joey Lucchesi, and the Megill/Peterson tandem expected to bounce between the majors and minors.

This year’s bullpen is capable of outperforming last season’s crew. It’s just as likely the club is searching for a midseason addition or two well before the trade deadline even arrives.

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