Sal was more than pleased to see the Mets explode in the ninth inning to convincingly beat the Padres, a team they are chasing in the Wild Card race.
It was a strong start to a pivotal road trip for New York, a team that still sits 1.5 games back of a playoff spot.
While the Mets have been one of the best teams in baseball since June, Sal can’t bring himself to fully enjoy the current ride, because he can’t help but think about there the team would be had they made one big move at the trade deadline to bolster the starting rotation.
“If they just made the aggressive move. It really drives me up a wall,” Sal said. “The reality is it even infuriates me more. In a year where everything is wide open, and it’s not absurd to talk about the Mets and Yankees playing in the World Series…If the Mets get in, who the hell knows what can happen here? But the one glaring weakness to me with the Mets is they don’t have that horse at the top of the rotation, and they could have had that with some aggression.”
The Mets have had some solid starting pitching this year, even without Kodai Senga, as Sean Manaea has been dealing, Luis Severino has bounced back very strongly from a miserable 2023, and David Peterson has been a surprising revelation. But Sal can’t help but wonder what the outlook would be for this team if that rotation was led by a Blake Snell.
“If we’re saying the Mets can go to the World Series, then that means it’s realistic. If it is realistic, the Mets could have furthered their odds of getting into the postseason…it does upset me,” Sal said. “I’m thinking this team can do something, and imagine if they actually got a real pitcher at the deadline and had that horse atop the rotation? Because, to me, that is their one glaring weakness.”