Mets general manager Billy Eppler said on Sunday after trading Max Scherzer that his team would not be punting the 2024 season away.
That’s not the message Scherzer got, which is why he opted to waive his no-trade clause to be sent to the Texas Rangers on Sunday for prospect Luisangel Acuna.
“I talked to [Eppler]. I was like, ‘OK, are we reloading for 2024?'” he recounted to Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic. “He goes, ‘No, we’re not. Basically, our vision now is for 2025-26, ’25 at the earliest, more like ’26. We’re going to be making trades around that.’
“I was like, ‘So the team is not going to be pursuing free agents this offseason or assemble a team that can compete for a World Series next year?’ He said, ‘No, we’re not going to be signing the upper-echelon guys. We’re going to be on the smaller deals within free agency. ’24 is now looking to be more of a kind of transitory year.'”
Scherzer’s comments obviously do not bode well for the Mets’ winter outlook as the free-agent market is flush with top-tier talent that owner Steve Cohen could make a big splash with.
After dealing the 39-year-old righty and fellow future Hall-of-Famer, Justin Verlander, who was sent to the Houston Astros on Tuesday, the Mets need to rebuild a majority of its starting rotation in 2024 — especially because the ineffective Carlos Carrasco will be a free agent, too.
There is also a need to address the designated hitter position that Daniel Vogelbach has failed to hold down in his one year with the club.
Since last season, it was expected that Shohei Ohtani would be an option to tick both of those boxes. The two-way, generational superstar is a free agent that will dominate the rumor mills this winter and is in line for the richest contract in Major League Baseball history.
His links to the Mets only strengthened aside from Cohen’s financial standing because Eppler was the man who signed him from Japan when he was GM with the Los Angeles Angels.
There is an abundance of other options to provide starting-pitching help in the free-agent market this winter, but it suddenly remains to be seen if Cohen would be willing to spend the dollars necessary to pick up an arm like Blake Snell, Julio Urias, Julio Urias, or Yoshinobu Yamamoto.
Currently, the Mets’ only starters under team control in 2024 are Kodai Senga, Jose Quintana, David Peterson, Tylor Megill, and Joey Lucchesi.
The Mets have done well to replenish what was once a thin farm system, acquiring outfielders Drew Gilbert and Ryan Clifford from the Astros in the Verlander deal. Gilbert will slot in as New York’s No. 4 prospect, two spots back of the newly-arriving Acuna. Acuna and Ronny Mauricio, the Mets’ No. 3 prospect, have an MLB ETA of 2024. Gilbert is projected to arrive in 2025.
It’s important to note that Eppler’s message to Scherzer could have been a tactic just to get the veteran ace to waive his no-trade clause — or the Mets will, in fact, dabble in playing the waiting game.
