PHILADELPHIA — What if the group had stayed together?
As the Mets play out their schedule, competing on a daily basis and winning at least as often as they lose in recent weeks, the thought has occurred to several players: Where would the team be in the wild-card race had the status quo, at the very least, been maintained at the trade deadline?
The Mets instead traded Justin Verlander, Max Scherzer, David Robertson, Mark Canha, Tommy Pham and Dominic Leone for minor league prospects.
On July 31 — the day before the trade deadline — the Mets were six games out of the NL’s last wild-card berth. As play began Thursday, the Mets were eight games behind for the final wild-card berth.
“I have thought about it a handful of times,” Adam Ottavino said before the Mets’ 5-4 loss to the Phillies on Thursday night at Citizens Bank Park. “But there is still no way to predict that. You try to think, ‘Where would we have won more games?’ And it’s hard to say without seeing it, but I have definitely thought about it a handful of times because it is true that, even though we kind of spun our wheels, we never fell way further out of it.
“A lot of teams are kind of limping to the finish line at the moment, and you would have thought there would be a couple of teams that would have played real well. That is part of the dynamic too, and that hasn’t happened for whatever reason.”
The Mets lost six straight games — at Kansas City and Baltimore — the week after the trade deadline. Since that losing streak, they are 21-21.
Six additional victories would have placed the Mets at .500 and left them three games behind the Cubs for the final wild-card berth as play began.
That still would have left the Mets as a long-shot for the postseason with just over a week remaining, but would have given them a puncher’s chance.
“It’s something that you say, ‘We’re in the position we are in now, but we definitely could have made a run at it,’ ” Brandon Nimmo said. “But we also could be in the position the Padres are in, where they kind of need to run the table the rest of this season just to get in. I have always been a big proponent of, ‘If you could just get in, you have got a shot,’ but it’s kind of human nature to look back and think that we have held kind of steady in the wild-card race. … We got rid of a lot of people at the trade deadline.”
The trades have allowed the Mets to evaluate players such as Mark Vientos and Ronny Mauricio, who have helped spark the lineup during this stretch.
David Peterson, Tylor Megill, Jose Butto and Joey Lucchesi have been steady performers in the starting rotation.
“It’s a human inclination to wonder ‘what if’ or ‘how,’ but I think going through this, this is the first time as a player I have kind of gone through this stage because every year we have either stayed the same what we had or went out and got pieces,” Pete Alonso said. “This is a transition, but also getting guys experience and getting guys that are going to be here for a really long time, like creating a culture. I think that is what we are doing right now. We are not only developing talent at the big league level, but also we are building chemistry, and I feel like we have been playing excellent baseball.”
Francisco Lindor admitted he has wondered where the Mets would be if the team remained intact.
But the shortstop said he also supports the decision that was reached by owner Steve Cohen and the front office to restock the farm system through the trades.
“It’s in the past, but we’re human — we have those moments,” Lindor said. “We think, we reflect on certain moments in the season, but it’s not just the trade deadline. There’s a lot of moments in the season.”
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