Two Moves to Radically Improve the Mets: Bogarts and Tomas

Although the Mets had a positive run differential on the season, the offense was the weak point for the Mets. (That means considering the bullpen problems were mostly “solved” with the development of Mejia and Familia throughout the season). The Mets lost a lot of close games, and some better hitting, or just more power, would go a long way with this club.

Bring in Tomas, the Cuban free agent. The downsides to to Tomas are obvious. He’s going to require a large, at least 6-7 year contract and he hasn’t played in the majors. However with his age and scouts’ view of his talent, he looks to overcome that. Going into last season, the Mets had a logjam in right field with Duda sitting there and Davis occupying first. Now with Duda clearly at first, Granderson could move to Left to make this work. The second downside is a lot of money sitting in the OF between Granderson and Tomas, therefore not only do they have to produce, but there needs to be a back up plan in case someone gets injured.

The second part of this plan is a bit more painful for the Mets. The advantage to signing Tomas is the Mets don’t need to move any of their pieces, but to get a short stop, they will. Bogarts is going to cost the Mets either a Syndergaard level prospect, which right now in the Mets organization is just Syndergaard (or Wheeler, but he is no longer a prospect) OR it is going require an established starter and hitter. For the Mets, this probably means Niese and Murphy. That is going to be painful. One pitcher looks to eventually be huge in the organization. The other situation requires the Mets to give up one of the more reliable starters and their best hitter last season. The hope here is that Flores or Herrera would fill in at second base. This is the part of the plan I’m most curious about. I would really like to do this without trading Murphy but outside of pitching chips, I’m not sure what else the Mets have to offer.