It's STILL Schadenfreude Week! Day 6! Can—will—the Mets rebuild???

I apologize for leaving off my smug reveling in the agonies of our crosstown chums, something occasioned by that grim intervention into human joy known as “work.” 

But now, on a damp, depressing day with no ballgame—a presaging of what is to come for us maybe as early as next week, let's stoke our freude again by celebrating the misery of others.  

The question yet remains: can the Mets rebuild? Again?

We started off by consulting the highest metaphysical authorities. And as the Magic Eight Ball would say, “Outlook not so good.”

Let us consider:

In six years of constant churn, the Mets have risen to a tie for first—and plummeted back to last. 

They have some hitters, and they may soon have one of the best all-around—and youngest—outfields in baseball, with Juan Soto, Carson Benge, and A.J. Ewing. 

But after a hard-slugging rookie season, their much-touted catcher, Francisco Alvarez, has looked more like Gary Sanchez. 

Marcus Semien, who they got to fill a hole at second, is 35 and has had his third straight poor year at the plate. Francisco Lindor, who has generally been an outstanding shortstop for them, was plagued by injuries and looked shaky when he did play. He’ll be 33 next year.

Bo Bichette bounced back after an awful start at third, but they never could find anyone who came close to replacing Pete Alonso at first. All sorts of young guys and vets alike who they counted on giving the team depth—Brett Baty, Mark Vientos, Ronny Mauricio, Jorge Polanco, Luis Robert, Jr., and Jarred Young—have failed to click, or flopped outright.

The pitching, meanwhile, was a disaster in 2026. The Mets are now touting their best young arms—Nolan McLean, Christian Scott, Zac Thornton, and Jonah Tong—as the core of an exciting new staff. But they’re not that young—24, 27, 24, and 23, respectively—and between them, they won all of 23 major-league games this year.

Edwin Diaz signing with the Dodgers at the start of the year was maybe not the terrible blow it seemed, but the Mets failed to come up with a replacement closer. They tried out Kodai Senga for the role, but his famous ghost pitch continues to ghost him. Other than that, it’s good ol’ “Mr. Soft Stuff,” Devin Williams, who was bad, then hurt. And he’ll be back again.

The Mets dealt away Clay Holmes and Luke Weaver, who had both been very effective for them—part of a huge, trading deadline purge that saw them deal away over one-quarter of the roster.

In return…they really didn’t get all that much. The best pick-ups look to be Jefferson Rojas, a middle-infielder who hit 27 homers in AA and a little bit of AAA ball this year, and who may be the real deal; Sammy Stafura, another good-looking middle infielder, from upstate, who is 21 but is  only in A+ ball, and maybe Bruin Agbayani, the son of Benji. 

(Yes, we’re THAT old.)

Beyond that, there wasn’t much added to a Mets farm system that in 2026 performed at, well, Cashmanic levels.

The Triple-A, Syracuse Mets, a hodgepodge of players moving up and down, managed a winning record and narrowly missed the playoffs this year. 

Other than that, only one of the Mets’ Dominican Summer League teams finished over .500. The system as a whole played .462 ball, with a 5.02 ERA, and a .722 OPS. 

By contrast, the Yanks’ less-then-stellar system played .539 ball, with a 4.82 ERA and a .798 OPS.

To give you an idea of just what disarray the Mets were in, some 39 hurlers pitched for the major-league team, and 64 for Syracuse—and no one won more than 5 games for the 'Cuse.

Sure, if there is major-league baseball next year, the Mets could sign, say, Tarik Skubal, and maybe Trent Grisham and Jazz Chisholm (I kid, I kid), hope that Lindor bounces back, find areal  closer somehow, somewhere, hope the kids keep developing in the outfield and maybe—maybe—put together a playoff contender again.

But even after six years of a heavy Wall Street hitter investing mightily in this team—even after a guy widely acknowledged as one of the best general managers in baseball has been in charge for three seasons—even with the hiring of what seems to be another baseball savvy manager, in Andy Green…the Mets still look to be going nowhere much. And for many years to come.

How could this happen?  

The answer now seems obvious. Tune in again tomorrow, the last day of the regular season—and the last day of Schadenfreude Week (more than coincidence?)...