No Imai
Morning Dose: Friday, January 2
☀️ Good Morning:
As we inch closer to spring training, there are still several attractive players available in free agency and trade. We know at least one of them is going to end up signing or being traded for less than we have imagined.
Stearns needs to make sure that favorable deal ends up being with the Mets.
Whether it’s Imai, Framber Valdez, Cody Bellinger, Kyle Tucker, or someone we aren’t even thinking about in trade, let’s not find out one of them was gettable on the type of short-term or less-than-your-top-prospects cost the Mets are trying to swing, and somehow another club swooped in and beat them to it.
That’s what I wrote on New Year’s Eve.
On New Year’s Day, Taysuya Imai signed a three-year, $54 million contract with the Houston Astros that maxes out at $63 million and allows him to opt out after each of the first two seasons.
For a player some had predicted would fetch nearly $200 million (!) over eight years, that sounds like a bargain. But unlike The Who song, it clearly wasn’t the best Stearns thought he could ever have.
Neither the Mets nor the Yankees were heavily involved in the Imai sweepstakes, per Jon Heyman. While the diminutive right-hander seemed like a good fit for a Stearns-run club — young and ultimately gettable on a short-term deal — they must not believe in his upside as much as others do, or as it turns out, they were as lukewarm as most of the league.
Imai boasts the potential of being a top-line starter with a mid-to-upper 90s fastball and deep arsenal made more deceptive with his low arm angle. However, some scouts view him as more of a mid-to-back-of-the-rotation type guy, an area where the Mets already have major-league depth.
A deal with opt outs after each of the first two seasons is also more player friendly than people realize. Imai essentially guarantees himself a respectable floor if things turn sour stateside, while leaving the door open to earn a much bigger payday if he proves competitive.
🤔 What now? The Mets remain linked to the top free-agents on the market. Like my single self standing next to an attractive woman at the bar before inevitably walking back to my table alone, they have “checked in” on the names you would expect. Whether they will have the courage to actually ask for a phone number and secure a date remains to be seen.
🎁 GIVING BACK: Thanks to your amazing generosity, I will be volunteering 30 hours of community service as a result of our holiday volunteer drive. I will share more details about that in the coming weeks. I invite all of you to join me in helping others in this new year. My daughter and I will lead the way in our Mets hats.
📈 DEEP DIVE
⇢ THE NEW BLACK HOLE?
by Blake Zeff
Older Mets fans remember the dark days before David Wright, when third base wasn’t a position so much as a rotating internship. From 1962 until Wright arrived in 2004, the Mets ran through 27 primary third basemen in 42 years, with none holding the job for even four straight seasons. It was a historic black hole of weak bats, bad throws, and Bobby Bonilla cameos.
Two decades later, a new question looms:
Is centerfield becoming the new black hole?
