With roster gutted, Showalter big loser at trade deadline
When the dust settled from last week’s trade deadline frenzy, the Astros, Rangers, Phillies and Rays could all consider themselves winners for having filled substantial starting rotation needs going forward, while it will take some time before the primary “sellers,” the Mets, White Sox and Cardinals, know how they fared.
The pundits who love conducting this exercise every year have already declared the Reds, who failed to land a desperately needed frontline starter to bolster their chances of winning the National League Centralandseeminglyhadtheprospects to get one, as the big losers at the deadline. There are others who will say the Yankees were losers for doing next to nothing, even though they had a whole lot of holes to fill but not a whole lot to offer in return.
But though it remained unspoken as Billy Eppler systematically blew up the 2023 Mets season and offered only muted hope about 2024, there was one notable loser to emerge in all of this and that would be Buck Showalter.
A year ago at this time, the overachieving Mets, without Jacob deGrom almost all season, were comfortably 3-4 games in first place and Showalter was being
hailed for having changed the losing culture in the clubhouse. This year, despite Steve Cohen having added some $80 million to the record payroll, it’s been just the opposite, with almost the entire lineup mysteriously underperforming — which led to the trade deadline sell-off of Max Scherzer, Justin Verlander, David Robertson, Mark Canha and Tommy Pham.
It was a gutsy decision by Cohen, especially since it meant eating some $89 million of Scherzer’s
and Verlander’s contracts, but it was clear the Mets weren’t going anywhere this year and the farm system was badly in need of replenishing. Despite being left with a depleted starting rotation, Showalter could certainly understand the sell-off — until that is Cohen further proclaimed that he did not expect to be spending more money in this winter’s quality-deep starting pitching free agent market that will include among others Aaron Nola, Lucas Giolito, Eduardo
Rodriguez, Blake Snell, Jordan Montgomery, Michael Lorenzen, Jack Flaherty and Julio Urias.
Showalter will be entering the final year of his contract in 2024, a year Cohen is now fully admitting is going to be a transition season as far as the Mets are concerned. At the same time, Cohen is planning on bringing in a new president of baseball operations after the season which by many accounts appears likely to be former Brewers GM David Stearns, who’s in the final year of his contract in Milwaukee. If so, it is worth noting that Craig Counsell is also in the final year of his contract as Brewers manager and has reportedly put off talks with the team about an extension.
In his press conference last week explaining the reasons for the Mets sell-off Cohen pointedly said he didn’t blame Showalter for the Mets regression this year. But he also pointedly said Showalter has a year and half left on his contract but, beyond that, “anything can happen.” It stands to reason, any new baseball operations boss is going to want a free hand — and that would include naming his own manager.
It remains to be seen how many of the bushel full of prospects Eppler got back in all his deals will turn out to be quality major league players. Of them, Luisangel Acuna, the shortstop/second baseman they got from the Rangers in the Scherzer deal, appears to be the closest. There were also highly favorable reports on Marco Vargas, the 18-year-old shortstop they got from the Marlins in the Robertson trade, and center fielder Drew Gilbert, the Rangers’ former No. 1 prospect, in the Verlander deal. But it is understandable if Showalter was watching all these deals going down, his guys, Robertson, Canha, Pham, et al., being shipped out, and listening to all the varying scouting reports on the prospects coming back and wondering if he’ll ever manage any of them.
Assuming he is allowed to finish out his contract, Showalter’s challenge will be to keep the Mets competitive with an almost entirely new rotation, presumably from within among Blade Tidwell, Christian Scott and Mike Vasil who all have shown promise in the Met system this year, and possibly Justin Jarvis, the lone starting pitching prospect Eppler got back in all his deals (from the Brewers for Canha) who’s gotten very mixed reviews.
Meanwhile, about the last place this weekend Showalter could have wanted to be playing with this torn down junker of a Mets team was Baltimore, the city of his greatest accomplishments and 699 wins as a manager.