The 2026 Mets season was never going to be remembered as a victory lap. It turned into a reset, and the more the rest of the league has played out, the easier it is to see why New York’s stop-and-start approach may have been the right one after all.
Around baseball, a few teams and players have spent the last few weeks making the Mets’ decision look a lot smarter in hindsight. Some of the problems they’re dealing with now are exactly the kind of mess New York avoided by backing off and focusing on the future.
Willson Contreras is one of the clearest examples. He’s been loud with the Boston Red Sox this year and has backed it up with huge numbers, but his comments after Boston’s quick playoff exit sounded like the kind of thing that would have clashed hard with how David Stearns runs things.
Willson Contreras: "It's not enough when you have talent, or you have data, or you have computers telling you what to do, because this is baseball. The data is here to help us, but at the end of the day, you need experience and veteran guys to win games. There's a lot of stuff I… pic.twitter.com/MS7u5yy96y
- Foul Territory (@FoulTerritoryTV) October 1, 2026
Earlier in September, when the Baltimore Orioles were facing the Mets, Rising Apple’s Pat Ragazoo made the case that Contreras would have been the best fit to replace Pete Alonso. On the field, that argument holds up.
But in a Mets clubhouse, it’s easy to imagine the friction. Contreras already carries real weight in Boston as one of the veteran voices there; in Queens, he likely would have been behind other players in the pecking order.
That’s the kind of dynamic that can get messy fast, and the Mets at least managed to avoid it.
The Philadelphia Phillies also ended up making New York’s path look more sensible. They needed all 162 games just to reach the postseason, then got only three more games and two losses out of it. They may still be the better team right now, but the long-term picture is a lot less encouraging.
Philadelphia’s problem is that the same core keeps hanging around, and the money attached to it keeps piling up. The club has a pile of expensive contracts that run for years, and the pressure is now on to shake things up.
Sean Manaea and Aaron Nola are close enough in value to make the comparison uncomfortable, but their contract situations are very different: Manaea has one more season left, while Nola has four. Trea Turner is 34 and still has seven years on his deal.
That’s a lot of baggage to carry, and it makes the Mets’ preference for shorter-term flexibility look a whole lot better.
Then there’s Houston, which somehow ended up at 81-81 and in the playoffs anyway because someone had to come out of the AL West. The Texas Rangers were slightly worse, and the Seattle Mariners were more 2026 Mets than they’d like to admit. But the Astros’ trip was not exactly a sign of strength.
They wasted another MVP-level season from Yordan Alvarez and now have Isaac Paredes and Jeremy Pena moving toward free agency. Another offseason trade feels likely, because that’s been their pattern in recent years.
It has worked before, but this time the roster looks stuck. Houston still hasn’t won a playoff game since Game 7 of the 2023 ALCS, and the bigger change may be coming sooner than some fans want to believe.
Their pitching numbers tell the story. The Astros posted a 4.45 ERA, which ranked 24th, and their starters were even worse at 4.81, good for 27th in MLB.
That’s the kind of staff that drags a team down. By comparison, the Mets have Nolan McLean, Christian Scott, and Zac Thornton pitching to about a run or better per 9.
It’s almost as if Houston was rolling out a rotation built around Sean Manaea’s 4.78 ERA, only without even that kind of production.
So while the Mets’ 2026 season wasn’t what anyone wanted, the league has done enough lately to make their detour look less like failure and more like a necessary correction.
In Other News...
Mets May Be Eyeing A Rotation Gamble They Know Too Well
The Mets are already thinking ahead to the post-2026 rotation picture, and it is easy to see why. Nolan McLean, Christian Scott and Zac Thornton give the organization some younger arms to work with, but a staff built around prospects usually still needs a veteran stabilizer, especially if the club wants to keep its window open and avoid leaning too hard on unproven depth.
One name that has surfaced is Tyler Mahle, whose recent performance makes him appealing on paper even as his injury history remains part of the conversation. For the Mets, the attraction is obvious, but so is the danger of chasing a pitcher whose availability has been a question before, which is why any serious push would need a credible backup plan if the Braves starter proves too risky to trust as the answer. [Read more 🡒]
Former Mets Arm Is Giving Fans A Trade Deadline Gut Check
The Mets long view this week stretches well beyond the standings, with one familiar arm offering a reminder of how quickly a roster decision can echo into October. Freddy Peralta, who was dealt from the Mets to the Tampa Bay Rays, spoke about the move and sounded content with the new role he has carved out in the ALDS, a tidy little gut check for anyone still wondering what might have been.
At the same time, the organizations future is still taking shape elsewhere, as prospect Cole Mathis is unveiling a new hitting stance in the Arizona Fall League. Between that development track and the broader postseason action, with the Dodgers beating the Braves and the Brewers topping the Padres, it is another snapshot of how one franchises present and future can overlap in a hurry. [Read more 🡒]
Mets Deadline Haul Already Features One Prospect Fans Will Obsess Over
The Mets did more than patch a roster at the trade deadline, they also added a crop of prospects who give the organization some real long-term intrigue. Among the names that landed in the system were Aidan Smith, Gabe Davis, Emilien Pitre, Billy Amick and Jefferson Rojas, a group that already gives the front office a few different developmental paths to watch as the minors fill out over the next few seasons.
Rojas stands out at the top of that list because the upside is easy to see, especially for a club that has been searching for young infield talent to keep moving forward. The evaluation around the group is less about immediate help than future value, but Rojas has emerged as the one to circle most closely, with a possible path to taking over at third base in 2027 if everything develops the way the Mets hope. [Read more 🡒]