Grading the offseason moves the Mets made and didn't make

Mets sign Adam Ottavino

The last move the Mets made this offseason was signing Adam Ottavino to a one-year $4 million dollar deal. In my eyes, Ottavino essentially replaces Jeurys Familia's spot in the bullpen. He's a guy who strikes out a ton of hitters but can lose control of the strike zone at times. Ottavino struck out 10.3/9 (great) while walking 5.1/9 (not so great).

Ottavino has dominated right-handed hitters in his entire career, holding them to a .213/.296/.329 slash line with just 31 home runs allowed in 1,299 at-bats. Righties have an 82 OPS+ against him in his career. The lefties get to him a little more, but they did not hit a single home run against Ottavino in 101 plate appearances this past season.

I like the signing. The Mets got him for one year and cheap money. If it doesn't go well, it wouldn't even be a bad idea to release him at some point in the season. But Ottavino has shown he has a lot of upside with success in New York City.

In the 2019 season, Ottavino had a 1.90 ERA in 73 appearances for the Yankees. The season before that he had a 2.43 ERA in 75 appearances for the Rockies. I don't expect Ottavino to pitch to that level, but the Mets don't need him to do that. Ottavino just has to be a veteran the Mets can rely upon to give them a clean inning when they need it. He won't be the closer or even the eighth-inning man.

The only thing I am disappointed about is Ottavino is the best reliever they signed. I wish the Mets addressed the bullpen a little bit more.

There is virtually no risk to this deal with insanely high reward. If he's bad then oh well, at least they didn't give him much money. But if he's good, the Mets hit the jackpot. They did it with Aaron Loup last offseason, maybe they did it again with Ottavino.

Grade: B