Mets Scapegoats: 1 person to question, 1 to remain patient with, 1 perfect patsy

3) Billy Eppler is the perfect patsy for the Mets’ failings

Want to blame someone for how bad the Mets are? Billy Eppler is the perfect patsy. The club’s former general manager would be on the hot seat right now if he had stayed. And just because he is no longer employed by the Mets doesn’t mean we feel any better about some of the decisions he made.

Eppler’s overspending already put the Mets in a deep hole. However, it’s the number of years he gave to Starling Marte, a player option unnecessarily handed to Omar Narvaez, and multiple failing contract extensions further tarnishing his reputation. That’s not to say we disagreed with the Edwin Diaz or Jeff McNeil deals at the time. They just haven’t worked out as planned. We can throw the unneeded Tomas Nido extension in there as well.

Is Eppler actually all that responsible for the team’s poor play this year? As bad as many of the players he had a hand in signing have performed, it’s hard to reasonably blame him all that much. Lindor was already here and even if you disagreed with the McNeil extension, he would’ve been under team control for the 2024 season. 

Eppler left the Mets in a better spot than they were at the beginning of 2023. Getting the greenlight from Steve Cohen to unload contracts at the 2023 trade deadline drastically boosted the farm system. 

It’s easy to make Eppler into a scapegoat for who the Mets are today. Frankly, it’s undeserved.