Jesse Winker is back! But at what cost?

I’d like to start off this blog by saying I am absolutely thrilled to have Jesse Winker, his antics, and his seemingly tight bond with Francisco Lindor and the other New York Mets back on my favorite ball club. Unfortunately, as things tend to trend in ‘Met Land’, the news of his signing was overshadowed by the melting ice berg seemingly drifting a pumpkin-loving Polar Bear away from the confines of Queens. If you aren’t aware, reports from sources around the league have stated that the Jesse Winker signing has signaled the ‘Plan B’ to Pete Alonso approach, or as I like to call it, ‘The post-Polar-Bear-Plan’ for the Mets.

Before I get into why I think letting the guy with the second most home runs in baseball since 2019 is a mistake, I have to acknowledge the “fire starter” of the Alonso news was none other than SNY’s Andy Martino. Martino, who has been begrudgingly known as the bearer of bad news among ‘Mets Twitter’ for the last decade, is of course employed by the team’s broadcasting partner, SNY. SportsNet New York, which is still owned by Sterling Mets and the Wilpon Family, was one of the few things those crumb-feasting, penny-pinching, ponzi scheme believing, former owners of the New York Mets kept from Steve Cohen in the sale.

Now, Martino saw the loose-lipped, poorly managed Wilpon regime first hand for much of his tenure at SNY, making it comically easy to be a bad news bear of Mets reporters. The Cohen regime hasn’t allowed him nearly as much opportunity to do that. I type all of that to say this, Steve Cohen and David Stearns are smart people that have excelled in their respective professions in ways I find both admirable and enviable. There is no way on Grimace’s Purple Earth that the little amount of news that leaks out of Mets camp has no strategy behind it. An Alonso homecoming is still a perfect fit for both sides, and the report from Martino is nothing but a warning to Scott Boras. Either Pete will be back, or he’ll be a Blue Jay after Vladimir Guerrero Jr. crosses through a few broken tables in Buffalo on his way down to the cit(i).

I’ll deal with the fall out of the Alonso saga in a later blog – or possibly on a podcast once Matt laughs at me – but for now I want to rant a little bit about Jesse Winker. The 31-year-old came to New York last season and the trade deadline and, well, made me love him as much as I loved Grimace, Jose Iglesias and his song, and the rest of the bunch. The Buffalo native’s first home run with the Mets was a walk off where he proceeded to ‘Gronk Spike’ his helmet into the ground before making Orioles announcers sob and wine for the entire 30 seconds he took rounding the bases.

Then he did it in the postseason, both the helmet spike thing and the home run thing, on multiple occasions. Then he had the “Let’s Go Mets” quote after about five beers and a couple cigars. Then… well then he got benched. Out of all the things manager Carlos Mendoza got right last year, that was the one glaring decision that he got wrong. Winker didn’t play for much of the NLCS loss to the Dodgers despite a team-leading postseason OPS, creating a further “unfinished business” narrative that he can now attempt to tie up with a bow this season.

There’s still a need at first base, but the signing of Winker completes the dynamic, and extremely fun, designated hitter platoon between himself and Starling Marte. The vibes, while slightly down from the Pete news, are still a beautiful shade of orange, blue, and purple (and rainbow when they become the ‘Gay Mets’ in July).

L.F.G.M

Side not before I end the blog here, Jesse Winker is the franchsie leader in playoff triples. I’m not sure if that is a sad fact or not. More to come.

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