‘No question,’ New York Mets could consider trading superstar

The New York Mets are one of the most confusing teams in baseball.

In its first 36 games of the season, the team lost five games in a row, while winning six games in a row. They beat the Los Angeles Dodgers several times and lost to the San Francisco Giants several times.

Their season has been a roller coaster a lot more often than you might think, considering they hold an 18-18 record (a .500 winning percentage) entering play Friday.

How they achieved such mediocrity is also surprising. Their already thin starting rotation took a big hit in spring training, when ace Kodai Senga suffered an arm injury.

How did they react? Their remaining pitchers have a combined ERA of 3.72, 12th best in baseball. As a reminder, last year’s World Series champions, the Texas Rangers, rank 16th in ERA.

To their credit, the Mets offense has the 15th best team batting average in baseball, but none of their stars deserve any credit for that performance. Star shortstop Francisco Lindor is hitting a whopping .211 this season, while star first baseman Pete Alonso is hitting .212.

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Lindor is in it for the long haul due to his contract, but Alonso’s future with the franchise isn’t as certain. He’s a free agent after the 2024 season, and with super-agent Scott Boras representing him in negotiations, the process won’t go smoothly.

So the Mets have a powerful, player-friendly player with an expiring contract who will command a small fortune in order to stay in Queens. If New York isn’t in contention by this year’s trade deadline and Alonso doesn’t help them win a World Series, might another team want to hire his services instead?

We floated the once-ridiculous idea of ​​trading Pete Alonso from ESPN’s Buster Olney on The Drive with Dan Bahl on Friday. Here’s what he had to say about Alonso’s status, as well as a number of other baseball-related topics, during his weekly appearance on our show: