As the Mets and Yankees begin spring training, Gio poses a key question for both teams, who will both be entering the 2023 campaign with championship aspirations.
Has either team gotten better from its predecessor?
The Yankees, who reached the ALCS but were emphatically swept by the hated Astros, brought back the top free agent on the market in Aaron Judge, and added one of the top pitchers on the market in Carlos Rodon. But Gio still sees a lot of the same problems that plagued the 2022 Yanks.
"Bringing Aaron Judge back was imperative…they brought in Rodon, another guy who has dealt with a ton of injuries in his career, so we'll see what happens there, and you still have Aaron Hicks and Josh Donaldson starting," Gio said. "What did you really do in this offseason to make this team better?"
For both the Mets and Yankees, Gio says it will come down to how the youngsters perform. For the Mets, it will be Brett Baty and Francisco Alvarez, who will need to bring more pop to an offense that largely just retained this offseason, with the signing of Brandon Nimmo. For the Yanks, it will be their hyped infield prospects, who could help with the left side of the infield that produced little on offense last season.
"Is it [Anthony] Volpe? Is it [Oswald] Peraza?" Gio said. "Those two guys, I would think you have your eyes on them."
Overall, both teams have to do a lot of retaining this winter. The Mets lost Jacob deGrom and quickly replaced him with another star in Justin Verlander, then lost Chris Bassitt and grabbed Kodai Senga. Will they be able to put up better numbers than their predecessors did last season? Can the Yankees count on another 62-homer season from Judge?
"Do you feel like they got that much better?" Gio asked. "The Mets too, I don't feel like they got that much better."
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