On the highway to nowhere that connects with the border of irrelevancy, the Mets are stuck in the middle lane.
Even with his team much closer to last place than first in the NL East, general manager Sandy Alderson on Friday labeled the Mets as “in the middle” — somewhere between the clear buyers and sellers — heading toward the July 31 non-waiver trade deadline.
Alderson acknowledged he has spoken with teams that might have interest in his players, but categorized it as too early to say in what direction the Mets are headed.
“We need some more wins,” Alderson said before the Mets faced the Dodgers at Citi Field, when asked if his team was still playing for 2018. “We are 10 games under .500 and we need to see some improvement in our win-loss record almost immediately. I think we recognize that.”
The Mets, who went 3-7 on their last road trip, arrived home trailing the Braves by 11 ½ games in the NL East. They were 8 ½ games behind the Nationals in the race for the second wild card. Beyond their distance in the standings was the fact the Mets had lost 40 of their past 60 games since beginning the season 11-1.
“At the same time, we are still in the middle of June and most teams are still trying to sort out where they are and what they are going to do and a lot of it depends on what happens over the next two or three weeks,” Alderson said.
“We have had conversations with teams, but nothing that I would call substantive and really just getting a sense of what direction they think they are headed. There are a few teams that are going to be buyers, there are a few teams that are going to be sellers — there are a bunch of teams in the middle — and I would put us in the middle.”
In Jacob deGrom and Noah Syndergaard, the Mets have two top-tier starting pitchers who could command a haul in prospects if they were dealt. The Mets are unlikely to deal either, but Alderson acknowledged it makes sense to at least listen if teams inquire about the stud right-handers.
“We know what we have in deGrom and Syndergaard,” Alderson said. “I don’t know that any team will tell you, ‘We are never going to do this or do that.’ If somebody came to us and said, ‘We’ll give you all of our top 20 prospects,’ it’s probably something you would have to at least consider, but we know what we have in those two pitchers.”
Other pieces that could be appetizing to suitors include Jeurys Familia, Zack Wheeler, Steven Matz and Asdrubal Cabrera.
Last year, with the Mets dead in the playoff race, Alderson went on a late-season selling spree in which he unloaded Lucas Duda, Addison Reed, Jay Bruce, Neil Walker and Curtis Granderson. The veteran outfielder Bruce later re-signed with the Mets on a three-year contract worth $39 million.
Another of Alderson’s offseason additions, Todd Frazier, recently said he is against the idea of the Mets rebuilding. And both manager Mickey Callaway and pitching coach Dave Eiland have expressed the desire to keep the team’s top guns in the starting rotation.
Alderson said voices outside of the front office are often heard, but won’t dictate what direction the organization takes.
“I don’t think player opinion or fan opinion controls our decision making,” Alderson said. “But I think we do factor in [opinion]. It doesn’t mean we always come out consistent with how those opinions have been expressed, but to say they are not factor would be to sort of ignore the obvious.”
