A move from 162 games to 154 would not sound like much on paper, but for the Mets it could rewrite recent history in a hurry.
MLB has already floated the idea to the MLB Player’s Association, and the basic logic is easy enough to see: fewer games to help keep players healthy, plus some added postseason revenue. On the surface, it also feels like the kind of change both sides could live with. But for the Mets, eight games is not a small detail at all.
The biggest twist comes in 2025. After 154 games, the Mets would have been sitting at 80-74, good enough for the third Wild Card spot.
They would have held a two-game edge over the Cincinnati Reds, who ended up taking that spot in Game 162. Under that setup, the Mets would have faced the Los Angeles Dodgers in the NLWC.
That shorter series might have offered a cleaner path than having to win 3 out of 5.
And this isn’t just about one season. Back in 2024, the Mets still reached the postseason, but the shape of it changes under a 154-game schedule.
The article notes that the Mets played the Atlanta Braves in a doubleheader to close out the year, a wrinkle that would have landed earlier in a shortened season. More importantly, after 154 games the Mets would not have been headed to Milwaukee.
The Brewers and San Diego Padres both finished 88-66, but Milwaukee owned the NL Central while San Diego would have been the top Wild Card team.
What happens from there is anybody’s guess. There’s no way to know whether Pete Alonso still gets his shot against Devin Williams, or whether the rest of the postseason plays out the same way. The point is that the path looks different immediately.
The ripple effects go even deeper. A 154-game schedule would also have changed 2007, when the Mets’ collapse would not have happened because they still led the Philadelphia Phillies after 154 games. And in 2022, the Mets would have won the NL East over the Atlanta Braves and earned a bye past the first round.
That’s the strange part of this whole idea: eight fewer games feels small, but it reaches back and reshapes more than one recent Mets season. It could even matter in the future, though the source makes clear 2026 would not have been saved either way. The Mets still would have missed the postseason.
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