Nevertheless, the Mets’ absence in the playoffs now creates a void for those who wanted to see more Mets baseball in October. There will still be baseball, but now fans will have to find other teams to support in the meantime. With the field now narrowed down to six (sorry, Carlos Beltran), what should be the preferred rooting order?

6. Los Angeles Dodgers

Former Mets: Justin Turner

No, absolutely not. They have Chase Utley, not to mention a couple other former Phillies who gave fans headaches. It would be hard for a team that isn’t in the NL East to take the bottom spot on this list, but that’s the power of Utley. Not even Turner’s glorious red locks can come close to making up for that. There’s also the fact that their World Series title drought is roughly as long as the Mets’ and they simply can’t be allowed to snap it before the Mets snap theirs.

5. Washington Nationals

Former Mets: Daniel Murphy, Oliver Perez

It was disappointing enough that the Mets couldn’t surge ahead of the Nats late this year as they did in late 2015, but that’s the wisdom of gradually dropping Matt Williams, Drew Storen, and Jonathan Papelbon from the organization. There is no sense in cheering for the primary division rival. It’s not quite to the crazy level of a Cardinals fan pulling for the Cubs or a Yankees fan hoping the Red Sox can survive, but the point still stands. Sorry, Murph.

4. San Francisco Giants

Former Mets: Angel Pagan

The team that knocked the Mets out only ranking third-worst here is a testament to the grim reality of the field. However, #EvenYearBullshit can be only be tolerated so much, particularly since Bumgarner almost single-handedly eliminated the Mets, save for a three-run blast from a classic “who?” Giants hero, Conor Gillaspie. They’ve won enough. It’s time for someone else.

Knowing the Giants, there is a very low chance that this season doesn’t end with Eduardo Nunez proudly holding the World Series MVP.

3. Chicago Cubs

Former Mets: None

The Cubs are the last NL team to be mentioned, but only because the idea of a championship for them is not as bad as it would be for the other three clubs. Like the since-eliminated Red Sox, they do have that awesome young core, and it’s not like they caused any problems for the Mets last year en route to their NL pennant. So as fun as it would be to see that championship drought continue, they’re palatable enough to make them the best NL option, despite Joe Maddon’s cutesy quirks.

2. Toronto Blue Jays

Former Mets: Ezequiel Carrera (minors), Jose Bautista (lol)

When this offense is rolling (as they did in the ALDS), it’s a lot of fun to watch, as the Blue Jays have tons of dinger threats. It’s kind of unbelievable that they had to settle for a Wild Card. It is incredibly difficult to find relief in this lineup, as Josh Donaldson, Edwin Encarnacion, and Jose Bautista provide formidable threats right in the heart of it, and both Russell Martin and Troy Tulowitzki had 20 homers this year, as well. The fan base has had its ugly moments, and Donaldson has been a bit hyper-sensitive about remotely close pitches. They still aren’t a bad option, especially for those unenthused by the NL crop.

1. Cleveland Indians

Former Mets: None

Numbers one and two can be easily flip-flopped. The Indians’ whole brand is pretty gross, from the name to Chief Wahoo to fan behavior. If the team was named anything else, this would be a no-doubter. Pretend they’re called the Fightin’ Franconas.

The Fightin’ Franconas just have a tremendously entertaining team, with terrific defense from the likes of Francisco Lindor and an underrated offense led by Carlos Santana, Mike Napoli, and up-and-comers Tyler Naquin and Jose Ramirez. The pitching would be even more tremendous if they were at full strength, but watching Corey Kluber robotically mow through lineups is all the fun of Bumgarner without it actually being Bumgarner.

Also, Terry Francona has expertly managed the bullpen and is willing to use super-reliever Andrew Miller in just about any spot, even as early as the fifth inning. It’s refreshing to see both a manager embrace that fireman role, and for the pitcher himself to fully support it. They have the longest title drought in the AL at 68 years. Maybe it would nicer if they broke it next year, but the Fightin’ Franconas are a fine pick.

Photo Credit: Greg M. Cooper-USA TODAY Sports

Madison Bumgarner is probably the greatest pitcher in modern postseason history. He was very good in 2010, had his only two bad playoff appearances ever in 2012 backed up by a sensational World Series start, and turned into this millennium’s Old Hoss Radbourn in 2014, immune to rest cycles and pitch counts, the normal laws of pitching and all of that silly stuff. He blanked the Mets for nine innings over 119 pitches, and probably could’ve gone further had the Giants not scored in the top of the ninth. Noah Syndergaard was even better over seven, but one of the majors’ best late-inning bullpens couldn’t continue to hold serve, and the Mets went down for the offseason.

It happens. It sucks. I probably won’t see another live baseball game this year, and that’s always a sad realization. Our friends in the booth scatter for four or five months. You’ll only hear Gary Cohen calling college basketball, Josh Lewin calling San Diego Chargers football, and Ron Darling calling AL playoff baseball … for a few weeks anyway. You won’t even hear the soothing voice of Howie Rose on Islanders hockey anymore, because he retired from that gig. Keith Hernandez will go back into winter hibernation in Sag Harbor and Florida.

We had a lot of fun as Mets fans in 2016, and I think it’s important to keep sight of that through the sadness of the end and the anger of how it ended. The 2016 Mets, for much of the season, were just supposed to go away, buried in the divisional race and close in the wild card race, with stars dropping hurt left and right. Yet they never fell totally out, and blitzed the National League over the last six weeks. How remarkable is it that this team with this roster had a home playoff game?

There were a lot of good times. You might not even remember all of them. So let’s take a brief stroll down memory lane and revisit the 2016 Mets.

There was Asdrubal Cabrera’s bat flip on a season-defining homer that somehow topped Yoenis Cespedes’ 2015 NLDS bat flip.

Bartolo Colon hit a home run!

Remember when Cespedes hit a grand slam in April to finish off a 12-run inning?

We saw what might be the last great David Wright moment, the walk-off on Milwaukee.

We had the pleasure of seeing unique talents like Yoenis Cespedes and Noah Syndergaard perform regularly. Remember Cespedes and Noah Syndergaard trotting in on horseback during spring training? That was pretty great.

Fanbase darling Wilmer Flores turned his season and maybe his career around with a six-hit game, then launched a Citi Field craze by changing his at-bat music to the theme from Friends.

We all sang along to “Danza Kuduro” for Jeurys Familia.

The Mike Piazza weekend finally fully honored one of the team’s icons.

The emergences of Robert Gsellman and T.J. Rivera and Seth Lugo catapulted a team left for dead several times into the playoffs.

And yes, we can even fondly remember Syndergaard throwing the game of his life in a double-elimination game–

—and Curtis Granderson’s catch that, in another timeline, propels the Mets on another miraculous playoff run.

Soon we’ll be talking hot stove and the Rule 5 Draft and Yoenis Cespedes’ opt-out and the confounding Conforto catastrophe and all that good stuff. The memories of 2016 will fade into the background. But today, this week, let’s look back at the 2016 Mets and smile. Even through overwhelming injuries, it was an awful good year to be a Mets fan. And 2017 could be even better. Don’t let another one of Madison Bumgarner’s masterpieces ruin that for you.

Photo Credit: Jake Roth-USA TODAY Sports

Baseball being baseball, and the Mets and Giants being two very weird ball clubs, there was a sense of impending ironic detachment; there was no way that the game itself could live up to the hype. Perhaps one team or the other would break it open early, and the aces would be chased before the fourth inning? But no, it was exactly what we’d longed for. Madison Bumgarner, the throwback lefty who eats innings like they are scrambled eggs and surges in October, threw nine not-quite-perfect and yet masterful innings, mixing up pitches and out-working and out-thinking each of the Mets’ hitters. And Noah Syndergaard, the hard-throwing phenom, threw seven brilliant innings, took a no-hitter through 5.7 of them, and left the game with 10 strikeouts and no runs allowed.

Read the rest at Baseball Prospectus.

Photo Credit: Anthony Gruppuso-USA TODAY Sports

Nevertheless, the lead-up to the showdown should be exciting. It might be hard to remember the last time there was a do-or-die game with the Mets that featured two pitchers this good. However, there have been a few precedents. In their all-time playoff history, the Mets have played just six games that met this simple parameter: if the Mets lost, they went home; if they won, they advanced. (This does not count the 1999 Wild Card playoff game against the Reds, which counted toward regular season statistics.)

Syndergaard vs. Bumgarner immediately vaults to the top of the discussion of the Mets’ best win-or-go-home showdowns, but which others would be in the mix? Not all of them are Ollie Perez against Jeff Suppan, after all.

1973 NLCS: Tom Seaver vs. Jack Billingham

Everyone remembers Seaver, but Billingham was a terrific pitcher in his own right for the “Big Red Machine.” While the offense was the star of the show, Billingham was an All-Star in ’73, leading the league in starts (40), shutouts (seven), and innings pitched (293.3). Seaver took home the Cy Young Award that year but Billingham received a couple first place votes as well, good enough for him to finish fourth in balloting.

Seaver and Billingham’s combined WARP of 12.6 (9.6 for Seaver, 3.0 for Billingham) is the highest of any do-or-die Mets playoff game, including Syndergaard vs. Bumgarner (11.2). Seaver does the heavy lifting, but Billingham was still the Reds’ ace. It was the coda of a thrilling NLCS where the heavy underdog 82-win Mets some took down Cincinnati’s vaunted 99-win powerhouse in a best-of-five. The Reds had forced a decisive Game 5 with a 12th-inning victory in Game 4, leading to the Seaver vs. Billingham finale.

The superior talent prevailed. With the score deadlocked at 2-2, the Mets knocked Billingham from the game in the fifth with a two-run double by Cleon Jones. Seaver went 8.3 innings of two-run ball before some walks led Yogi Berra to call on Tug McGraw to seal the 7-2 victory. He did just that and the crowd went crazy, storming the field.

1988 NLCS: Ron Darling vs. Orel Hershiser

The more fan-friendly choice would be to tab Ron Darling’s 1986 World Series Game 7 start against Bruce Hurst. Unfortunately, while Hurst was no slouch with a 2.99 ERA and that ended in an iconic win, it would have been a much better showdown if it was Roger Clemens pitching for Boston. Alas, it was not. So the more thrilling Darling matchup has to be a loss, when the Mets were tasked with somehow stopping the sensational Orel Hershiser in Game 7 of the 1988 NLCS. Even though WARP is not as fond of Hershiser and the record-setting scoreless streak he posted during the ’88 regular season, the 10.2 combined WARP between Darling and Hershiser is still quite good.

The Mets had extremely high expectations for ’88 after the fun of ’86, and with 100 wins, they were six games better than the NL West champion Dodgers. It seemed like they had a good grip on the series in Game 4. They were three outs away from taking a 3-1 series lead with Dwight Gooden on the mound. Then Mike Scioscia of all people tied it up with a two-run homer in the ninth. The Mets lost both that game and the next one, needing a five-hitter from David Cone simply to force Game 7.

One pitcher was dominant. The other was not at all. Regrettably for the Mets, the latter was Darling, who was pounded and removed without recording a single out in the second. When the dust settled, the Dodgers were up, 6-0, and though the Mets outlasted Hershiser in Game 3, he recaptured that shutout form from the end of the regular season. He went the distance on a five-hit shutout that ended both the Mets’ season and their hopes of more than a single championship from that overpowering mid-‘80s squad.

2015 NLDS: Jacob deGrom vs. Zack Greinke

Perhaps this marquee matchup was forgotten too quickly. This was another Mets/Dodgers make-or-break showdown, though this one ended in the Mets’ favor. Greinke was phenomenal in 2015 for L.A., posting a 1.66 ERA and finishing just behind Jake Arrieta for the NL Cy Young. Meanwhile, deGrom received down-ballot support for his superb season, proving that his Rookie of the Year campaign from 2014 was no fluke.

The Dodgers had been the favorites over the Mets, whose mere presence in the playoffs was a surprise. The Dodgers’ Game 2 win keyed by an infamous dirty slide was all that kept the series alive as it trudged to a decisive fifth game. Mets fans weren’t happy that more baseball was needed, especially with Greinke on the mound against them, but deGrom was up to the challenge.

Both pitchers allowed the other team to score in the first, and then settled into a duel. Greinke nursed a 2-1 lead until Travis d’Arnaud lifted a sacrifice fly in the fourth to score Daniel Murphy and tie it up. Then the playoff hero Murphy victimized Greinke with a solo blast in the sixth to put the Mets on top. Those were the only three runs allowed by Greinke in 6.7 innings, but deGrom did not surrender any runs after the first, leaving with six frames of two-run ball.

In a rare relief effort, Syndergaard dominated the seventh with two strikeouts. Then Jeurys Familia finished the Dodgers off with a two-inning save, fanning Howie Kendrick to end it.

May Familia end Wednesday night in similarly dramatic fashion.

Photo Credit: Chris Pedota/The Record via USA TODAY NETWORK

First, there’s my grandmother—patient zero of rabid fandom in the house, champion of Ty Kelly and “her little Nimmo”—has not doubted her Mets for a moment, and there’s no indication her faith has wavered today. For tonight’s game, she says, she’s ready. “I got my hat on, my shirt, on my clean underwear on—everything. I’m so excited.”  Look out, San Francisco. The underpants are coming for you.

Then there’s this theory I’ve got: the Mets tend to perform better against strong teams than they do in the games that should be easy wins. “Theory” is really a strong word, because the idea was based less on fact than that feeling of dread I get whenever the Mets come up against, say, the Braves. At first I thought it was just leftover panic from a 90s childhood, in which Atlanta dominated the NL East with 11 consecutive division titles from 1995-2000. But when I went to check, the stats justified my fears—the Braves ended the season in last place in the NL East going 68-93, but the Mets were still 4-8 in their matchups. The Mets also fared badly against the stragglers of the NL West, going 3-4 against the last-place Padres, and 1-5 against the Diamondbacks. (The Reds, last place in NL Central, are the exception to this trend—the Mets swept them in both their pre- and post-Jay Bruce series.)

Meanwhile, the Mets have performed extremely well against the NL frontrunner; they’re 5-2 versus the Cubs for the season, having racked up their highest score of 2016 in the 14-3 series finale win on July 3. And, of course, there’s last year.

Cubs in four. There’ll be some close games and the Mets could easily push it further, but I think the Cubs are a Whole Lot better a team.

— Matthew Trueblood (@MATrueblood) October 16, 2015

The Mets’ played their second highest-scoring game against the Giants, with Matz bringing home the 13-1 win on April 29; the team also broke a club record for most runs scored in a single inning–12 in the third–that night. While Bumgarner and the Giants’ even-year luck are fair causes for concern, the Mets were 4-3 against the Giants for the season.

Looking ahead, the Mets’ performance against the Nationals and Dodgers is slightly more mixed: they’re 6-10 against Washington and 3-4 against LA, but there are some bright spots in those numbers. Three of the Mets’ losses to the Nationals belonged to what turned out to be a very broken Harvey. Then, there is the sore buttocks of slugger Daniel Murphy. While the Mets have a closer record with the Dodgers, the Nationals have struggled whenever they face LA: Washington is 1-5 versus the Dodgers in 2016. All this to say, the Mets generally do well against the teams they will meet tomorrow and (crossing all crossable parts) on into the postseason. Perhaps they are more vigilant or adrenaline-pumped when they’re up against top-tier teams. Maybe they, too, are still filled with crippling ghost dread whenever they see the word “Braves.” Whatever the reason, it’s certainly been a theme this season, one that I hope continues.

Finally, the Mets have performed well as Wild Cards past. The Kings of Queens have twice been Wild Card picks under the previous system, and have advanced into the playoffs both times. In 1999, in a race against the Cubs and the Giants, the Mets had a rough September, leaving them tied with Cincinnati for the Wild Card spot. At the tiebreaking game, away from home, they shut out the Reds (courtesy Al Leiter and an impressive performance at the plate by Ricky Henderson) five-to-none, and advanced to the NLDS and eventually on to the NLCS, where the blasted Braves were waiting for them.

In 2000, the Mets were again the Wild Card, taking on the Giants in the NLDS. They won the series 3-1, and pressed on to meet the Yankees in the World Series …

… where we all know what happened next. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. For now, I too will put on my Mets paraphernalia and yell at my laptop screen tonight, and we’ll go from there. Meanwhile, I’ll take that 2000 victory over the Giants as a good omen. And speaking of that Subway Series, this year the Mets surpassed the Yankees in local TV ratings for the first time ever, boasting an average of 20% more viewers. That’s a big “W” in my book.

Photo Credit: Derik Hamilton-USA TODAY Sports

Perhaps the most critical question is this: how do you maximize the leverage of Noah Syndergaard’s innings given how large he looms as one of the game’s best pitchers?

The prevailing wisdom, up to this point, has been that the Mets would save Syndergaard’s next extended outing for their first true do-or-die elimination game. If the Mets were guaranteed a Game 163 on Monday, then they might push him back out of Sunday’s regular-season finale, to Game 163 if needed, or the Wild Card Game if not. Instead, the Mets seem to have chosen to start Syndergaard on Sunday unless they’ve already hit their magic number to clinch the Wild Card Game, a decision that on its surface seems a bit odd. So let’s lay out how the rotation would line up through the NLDS under various combinations:

Scenario A: Nothing Clinched, Syndergaard Starts Sunday

Syndergaard starts on Sunday. If a Game 163 is needed, the Mets have to start Seth Lugo. If a Game 164 is needed under a tiebreaker scenario, it’s basically a bullpen game with someone like Gabriel Ynoa or Hansel Robles leading off. Colon starts the Wild Card Game on Wednesday. The NLDS rotation is likely Syndergaard/Gsellman/Colon/Lugo/Syndergaard.

Scenario B: Game 163 Clinched, Hold Syndergaard Back

The Mets hold Syndergaard back on Sunday while having clinched at least a Game 163 but no more. They have to throw a bullpen game while trying to clinch, and lose. Syndergaard starts on Monday in Game 163. Lugo is available to start Game 164 if necessary. Colon still starts the Wild Card Game. The NLDS rotation is likely Gsellman/Syndergaard/Colon/Lugo/Syndergaard, since the Game 2 starter can pitch Game 5 on regular rest.

Scenario C: Wild Card Clinched, Hold Syndergaard Back

The Mets hold Syndergaard back on Sunday having already clinched, or get in without using Syndergaard. Syndergaard starts the Wild Card Game. Colon is available in relief on full rest. The NLDS rotation is likely Colon/Gsellman/Syndergaard/Lugo/Colon.

Scenario C certainly seems optimal, right? You want Syndergaard starting that Wild Card Game, all else being equal. But it’s not precisely equal, because starting Syndergaard on Sunday (or even Monday) gives you two Syndergaard starts against the Cubs in a potential NLDS. And there are a few more hidden advantages of Syndergaard starting Sunday:

• Syndergaard, no matter how much he throws Sunday, is going to be available out of the pen on Wednesday for probably two innings or thirty or forty pitches. The Mets have used him as a bullpen weapon like this before, most notably in last year’s NLDS Game 5. If you wanted to give him an extra day after such usage, you could even push him back to NLDS Game 2 without changing his availability for Game 5 because of what we discussed in Scenario B.
• MLB is starting all games on Sunday at 3:00pm ET to give no team a scheduling advantage on the last day of the season. If the Mets get up enough quickly–and remember they’re playing Philadelphia again here, hitting in the top of every inning as the road team–or whomever the Mets need to lose between the Giants and Cardinals is down early, the team can yank Syndergaard very early. If he gets out of the Sunday game quickly enough, you could safely wheel him back for more than the aforementioned two innings on Wednesday. You could even potentially start him again if the usage is light enough.
• The Met bullpen on Wednesday–coming off two likely off days and going into one definite off day–will be rested and ready to go. Jeurys Familia should be able to give you two full innings, as will Addison Reed, and Lugo would probably be on full rest to back Colon up. If you have a couple shutdown relievers, you need less length out of your starting pitcher in that game than in any elimination game you’ll ever see, short of a World Series Game 7.

I don’t believe these hidden advantages are enough to want to avoid starting Syndergaard in the Wild Card Game if everything sets up for it to go down that way, because that game has such absurdly high leverage. But I don’t think it actually hurts the Mets’ pennant chances that much if they have to burn him on Sunday if that game is also highly leveraged. It does decrease the chances of getting out of the Wild Card Game a bit, but probably less than you’d think given what the Met bullpen would look like for such a game. And it also increases the chances you can beat the Cubs.

Photo Credit: Steve Mitchell-USA TODAY Sports

Either way, the Mets seem fairly likely to appear in at least one of those games, especially since they have a very light schedule the rest of the way. (Baseball Prospectus has them at 71.6% playoff odds.) The Mets were tied with both the Cardinals and Giants for the Wild Card spots entering Wednesday. In an ideal world, those two teams do need that extra playoff game and they have to burn their aces (looking at you, Madison Bumgarner), weakening their odds.

What about the Mets’ starter though? Unless he suddenly gets hurt, Noah Syndergaard will be given the ball for the do-or-die game, whether it’s a play-in game or the official playoff. Since Syndergaard figures to receive at least a few down-ballot Cy Young votes, the Mets are in pretty good shape. Armed with a wicked arsenal and sporting 210 strikeouts to go along with a 2.36 ERA, 2.90 DRA, and 5.0 WARP, Syndergaard would be a formidable opponent for either squad.

Even with a pitcher as good as Syndergaard though, the Mets have a strong enough back of the bullpen with Addison Reed and Jeurys Familia that they can capably take over any close game. There is very little point to risk a tiring Syndergaard leaving a pitch up late in the eighth or ninth when they have high quality relievers available.

However, the middle innings present another story. Terry Collins will have a decision to make about how long he’s willing to stick with Syndergaard. Unless he runs into late situation where Jerry Blevins makes sense, there is a good chance that Syndergaard will present a better option than, say, Hansel Robles.

So how has Syndergaard typically fared later in games this year? Unlike most pitchers, Syndergaard has not struggled the third time through the order, which is usually a death knell for average starters. Opposing batters have improved from .215/.264/.306 the first time through to .275/.317/.438 the second time, only to fall back to .233/.284/.306 when Syndergaard is given a third shot. In 194 plate appearances, he has yet to surrender a single homer the third time through the order, though the eight allowed in 252 PA the second time is at least a warning sign.

There could be something to be Syndergaard pitch usage that might suggest how he would fare in the fifth, sixth, and seventh innings. With the help of Brooks Baseball, PITCHf/x, and FanGraphs, I made a table of how Syndergaard has tweaked his selection by inning (there were only 12 combined PA between the eighth and ninth, so they were omitted):

Syndergaard’s high-octane fastball is unsurprisingly his most commonly used pitch, though OPS against and PITCHf/x value both have his less-deployed slider as the most effective selection. The sinker has been fine, but it appears to be the weak link of his repertoire this year.

The problem is that as the game has progressed, Syndergaard has gradually eased up on the fastball and thrown that sinker more often than any other pitch from innings five through seven by a decent margin. Since the sinker has been hit harder than any of his pitches this year, this is not ideal.

Each batter naturally presents a different scouting report for the battery to use, which could certainly affect Syndergaard’s typical pitch selection. That being said, it’s possible that the Mets have found that his fastball is a little less useful in the middle innings. Sure, he can still dial it up to the high-90s, but it might not have as much command or movement.

If Syndergaard is rolling, Collins will probably stick with him into the seventh inning anyway, and that’s perfectly fine. The Mets will want Syndergaard to go deep and even relying on his sinker more often in the sixth or seventh, he is still a better option than Robles. The third-time-through-the-order concern is not present the same way for Syndergaard as it might be for other starters.

Should Syndergaard put a couple runners on in a close game in the seventh or maybe even with two outs in the sixth though, Collins should not be afraid to pull the trigger to bring in Blevins. In a do-or-die game, every at-bat becomes more magnified, and the Mets need to maintain any advantage they can find, even if it’s pulling their ace in a tense situation. They’ll just be glad if he doesn’t have a rare blow-up, like his start on Monday against the Braves.

Ideally, Syndergaard will throw shutout ball and this won’t be a problem. The game could be won or lost before Reed even enters though, so it will be imperative for Collins to pay close attention to Thor in the middle innings.

Photo Credit: Wendell Cruz-USA TODAY Sports

In the interest of getting ahead of myself, I’d like to take this time to make an educated guess about the roster the Mets might have to compose if (not when!) they were to make the playoffs. I’m not entirely certain that the team that the Mets face will dramatically affect their roster construction … but we’ll get to that later. With the WC game on October 5–and hopefully the Mets’ NLDS battle against the Cubs on October 7–we can expect the team to go full-out in order to maximize winning this one single game, then worry about the Cubs later. Most WC playoff teams go with a 16/9 split–nine pitchers and 16 position players–on their 25-man roster, and I think that’s what the Mets do as well. However, they are a team that I could also see leaning on a 10th pitcher if need be.

Barring injury, this my expectation as to who makes the Mets’ 25-man Wild Card Game roster.

Starting Pitcher

• Noah Syndergaard

There’s no chance it’s anyone else, right? If the timing lines up like I think it does, then Thor pitches on September 19, September 24, September 29 or 30, and then is ready to go on October 5 in the WC game. Even if deGrom and Matz were perfectly healthy, Syndergaard is going to likely score a top-three Cy Young finish, and he’d be a tough hack for the Giants, Cardinals, or any other team the Mets might have to face in a one-game playoff. He is, in fact, The Man.

Extra Starting Pitcher(s)

• Jacob deGrom (or Steven Matz)
• Seth Lugo

Here’s where it gets tricky, and we get to play the “what the heck is going on with the Mets’ pitchers” game. One has to assume that, even if deGrom or Matz make their unlikely comebacks, the team may be hesitant to throw one of the walking wounded out in Game 1 of a NLDS. Bartolo Colon and Robert Gsellman are more than likely the team’s additional starting pitchers for the playoffs in addition to Thor. But, I have a little faith that Stetson’s Finest will be able to at least throw a relief inning or two as he works his way back up to full health. Under the best of circumstances, maybe deGrom will be stretched back out enough to be a factor in the NLDS. Even then, I could certainly see him active for this Wild Card game. On the other hand, neither deGrom or Matz may be healthy here. If that’s the case, I’d expect Gabriel Ynoa to fill in.

(Later Friday Update: deGrom is now scheduled to start on Sunday, September 18. Hooray! That would certainly put him in line to pitch in the Wild Card game, or Game 1 of the NLDS.)

Lugo is probably the right combination of rested and effective to back up Syndergaard in case things go south in a hurry. I like him as a two-inning reliever in case Syndergaard is gassed or getting hit around and the Mets want to go to the ‘pen early, or as an insurance policy in case the game goes to 14 innings. His 2.40 ERA belies his 4.47 DRA, but I’d rather see his curveball than anything Logan Verrett has to offer these days.

(Sunday Update: deGrom is done, needing ulnar nerve surgery and out for the year. Time to play Gilmartin-Ynoa roulette!)

Relievers

• Jeurys Familia
• Addison Reed
• Jerry Blevins
• Josh Smoker
• Fernando Salas
• Hansel Robles
• Jim Henderson

A couple of these are easy, the rest are hard. The top six relievers here all feel like no-brainers: Familia and Reed are the nightmarish one-two combo that the Mets need from the right side. From the left side, Blevins has been crazy effective and Smoker gets strikeouts like Jack Leathersich was supposed to. Robles has been Terry Collins’ default for much of the season (62 appearances!), while Salas brings “veteran experience” but has also been killer in his eight innings with the Mets so far. They’re all in.

Henderson probably gets in on the strength of his story and veteran-ness, even though his last four outings with the Mets have been something like hot garbage. (Most of his season has been bad, but maybe you pop him in to get one key strikeout?) I’d probably rather have Sean Gilmartin here … even though he hasn’t been good either … because he gives the team another lefty to throw, and can eat three or four innings compared to Henderson who would likely struggle to go one. But we’re talking about the last guy at the back of the bullpen here–if either is pitching in the Wild Card game, chances are that the Mets have already lost it. And, of course, if anyone above gets injured, I have to imagine he’s the next guy up.

Catchers

• Rene Rivera
• Travis d’Arnaud
• Kevin Plawecki

If the Mets are smart, I’d certainly see them rolling with three catchers for the big game. This allows the team to start d’Arnaud against the Cardinals and Rivera against the Giants; d’Arnaud’s oft-criticized arm wouldn’t matter against the Cardinals and their NL-worst 32 stolen bases. (Yes, I know Thor is bad at slowing down the running game, I’ll still take Travis’s bat.) If Rivera does have to start, at least the team can use TdA as a pinch-hitter in a critical position, and Terry won’t have to worry about an emergency catcher due to the presence of Plawecki. Everyone wins, except Plawecki.

Infielders

• Jose Reyes
• Asdrubal Cabrera
• Wilmer Flores
• James Loney
• Kelly Johnson
• T.J. Rivera

Let me come right out here and say this: it’s not what I would do. But this isn’t about what I would do*, it’s about what I think the Mets will do. Reyes, Cabrera, and Flores have to be no-brainers if they’re all healthy–an open question with Flores–and technically all three can play shortstop. That’s probably enough to keep the team from pulling in Matt Reynolds or Gavin Cecchini (ha!) as a backup six, and gives them the freedom to go with T.J. Rivera or Ty Kelly as the sixth infielder.

(* – What would I do? Swap out Loney for Cecchini–and make sure he gets a few big-league PA before October. Pray Wilmer gets real healthy real fast. And think long and hard about swapping Rivera out for Brandon Nimmo, while using Conforto or Bruce as the first baseman against right-handers.)

James Loney is still the top first baseman on the depth chart, inexplicably, so he’s in. The guy who should be the starting first baseman, Kelly Johnson, will continue to be Terry’s dynamite pinch-hitter. The only real question here is if the team goes with the hot hand of Rivera over the switch-hitting of Kelly.

(Later Friday Note: Lucas Duda looks to be back with the team starting this weekend. It’s a no-brainer to replace Loney with Duda if he’s even at 75 percent capacity. Loney is an inferior hitter and stiff af.)

Outfielders

• Yoenis Cespedes
• Curtis Granderson
• Jay Bruce
• Alejandro De Aza
• Michael Conforto
• Juan Lagares

You’d hope that the team would be allergic to starting Bruce at this point, but I imagine it will be a cold day in hell before the team sits him–even if Madison Bumgarner is the opposing starting pitcher. While I remain hopeful that the Mets roll with a Cespedes/Granderson/Conforto starting outfield against the Cardinals’ Carlos Martinez, hope is for the weak. If the Mets are faced with Bumgarner, none of the team’s “hard-hitting” options of Bruce, Conforto, Granderson, or even De Aza are good ones. That would be an extremely challenging game. In the end, I expect TC to pencil in good old Yoenis in left field, and then two of Granderson, Bruce, or De Aza in center and right. Michael Conforto should be available off the bench, unless something happens over the next two weeks that causes Terry to renew his confidence in the team’s once and future second-best hitter.

Lagares, ostensibly, is just here to run and play defense. In a one-game playoff, that’s okay. But I sure wish he could hit if the team is going to match up with Bumgarner. I’d feel a whole lot better with a healthy Lagares in center flanked by Yo and Grandy (or Conforto!) against a lefty than any other grouping. I mean, I’d feel a whole lot better if this roster was wildly different, but they’ve gotten this far …

Photo Credit: John Hefti-USA TODAY Sports

Or is it?

Technically, the Mets are still alive despite being eight and a half games behind the Nationals entering play on September 7. According to the Baseball Prospectus playoff odds, at that time, they had a 0.4% chance to win the division. So in one out of every 250 scenarios, the Mets somehow win the NL East.

It’s a beautiful idea, and it’s fun to think about how this farfetched run could even happen. Sam Miller pondered the same in spring 2014 about the Astros’ longshot playoff dreams, and I did a similar exercise for the Yankees’ slim AL East odds at Pinstripe Alley. The obvious possibilities for a Mets title are there—Mets win 26 in a row, Nationals lose out, and Eric Campbell is named CEO of Iams.

Three Mets NL East champion scenarios in particular are pretty terrific though. For reference, these were all created before the results of Wednesday’s games.

1. Win a series, lose a series

In this simulation, the Mets simply win every series after the most recent sweep of the Reds, while also sweeping the one Nationals three-game set that they encounter. To allow the Mets back in it, the Nationals fail to win a single series from this point forward. They embarrassingly drop a series to the cellar-dweller Braves and can only tie the two four-game sets they come across against the dismal Phillies and Diamondbacks. So they finish the month with a dismal 11-18 record compared to the Mets’ 21-8

That all puts the Mets one game behind entering the last weekend of the season, when the Mets take two out of three from the Phillies while the Nationals drop their set against the Marlins and Mark Melancon tries to choke Daniel Murphy. That’s kind of how it worked in 2015, anyway, so why not again?

2. Feasting on the weak

The Mets blew it. They were riding an eight-game winning streak into their pivotal series against the Nationals, five games behind and vaguely threatening to make it a race again when … Washington promptly swept them out of town. It was all over, or so they thought.

At the very least, the Mets had the fortune to play some very weak opponents in September. They feasted on the light competition, going a combined 19-0 against the Braves, Phillies, Reds, and the Twins. It was an absurd request, and yet the Mets did it. Meanwhile, the Nationals followed the non-sweep pattern of the first scenario by losing or tying every series, finishing the month at 14-15.

So even though they swept the Mets, the Nationals dropped the season finale against the Marlins to force one-game playoff for the NL East crown on October 3. Given one more chance against their rivals, the Mets took advantage, beating the Nats to secure an improbable division title.

3. An amazin’ run

The scariest part about this final scenario is that you can almost squint and see it. It would require some superhuman play by the Mets, but taken on a series-by-series basis, it’s vaguely plausible.

The Mets might play the Phillies and Braves a combined 13 times, but they probably aren’t to go undefeated against them. They probably won’t sweep that very good Nationals team, either. So one loss has been granted against each of them. Although it will still be a tall order to go 11-2 against the Phillies and Braves despite their incompetence, they are very bad and it is more reasonable than 13-0. They will have to sweep that Twins series too, but they are the worst team in the AL for a reason.

Meanwhile, those same Phillies and Braves likely won’t be coming up big against the Nationals, so no series victories or even ties for them. The free-falling Pirates and Marlins will need series victories, though, but their true talent level probably isn’t what they are showing right now. Similarly, the Diamondbacks aren’t really a .420 ballclub and have only been a few games under .500 since the beginning of August; perhaps they have a split in them.

As the 2007 Mets brutally proved, even seven-game leads in mid-September aren’t always safe. If the NL East deficit is cut to seven or lower by September 12, then Mets fans will know from all-too-recent memory that it’s possible for the Nationals to collapse.

So it will come down to the final series of the season, when the Mets must sweep the Phillies (or allocate their one loss to them there) and the Marlins must take two out of three from the Nationals to force a one-game playoff. It would have to be at Nationals Park since even before this exercise, Washington clinched the season series, but anything could happen there.

Imagine Bartolo Colon throwing seven innings of one-run ball while Yoenis Cespedes puts the Mets ahead on a late two-run homer. Bryce Harper swings over a pitch from Jeurys Familia and the team storms the field.

Yes, that image is too good to be true. This just isn’t happening.

But dream the dream.

Photo Credit: David Kohl-USA TODAY Sports

And for a while, the rose-colored Citi Field remained. No matter that Daniel Murphy had shed his skin and revealed himself to be Iron Man while down in DC; we’ll take the moral points on that one. Anyway, the Mets were doing some hitting of their own, including the resetting of a team record in their twelve-run inning against the Giants.

When Wright went down it seemed both sad and inevitable, but I didn’t fear that the ship would go down with the Captain. The loss of Duda was an unpleasant surprise, the reanimation of Eric Campbell salt in the wound, but still there was a lot to be excited about. Walker and Granderson were hitting big hits. For a while there everyone—Colon! Syndergaard!—was hitting home runs. Harvey’s fourth-inning breakdowns seemed more mental than an injury that might require, say, the removal of body parts.

As the season wore on and the Mets’ lineup became increasingly unrecognizable, I latched onto the hope brought by the new, young faces—they were the future of the franchise, and the future was now. My grandma made a strong case for Ty Kelly and “her little Nimmo” in particular, while I kept an eye on fresh draft picks of the Cyclones and 51s. And hey, the backup to the backup catcher turned out to be pretty good!

Through the long, hot summer, midst the cacophony of Mets Twitter’s endless complaining, I argued that it could be worse, that the Mets were the comeback kings, and that hope lay in unexpected places, like bullpen pitchers who are not Jonathon Niese. And now here we are, September, and the Mets are actually playing well. Cabrera resurfaced from the DL to take NL Player of the Week at the end of August, and the Mets are just one game back from the Cardinals in the Wild Card spot (1.5 games behind the Giants). They’ve won 12 of their last 16 games, and beyond series in Washington and Miami, the Mets have a relatively easy final road—they’ll play two series against the last-place Braves and fourth-place Phillies, including 10 consecutive home games (Twins, Braves, Phillies) at the end of the month.

And yet despite the upswing, I find my optimism fading. Perhaps I should’ve rationed my Kool Aid better, or maybe the disintegration of the remaining pitching staff was, for me, the last straw. Either way, I find myself proposing what’s bound to be an unpopular plan for the final stretch of the 2016 season: surrender.

At this point, I don’t doubt we can clinch a Wild Card spot. It’s more a question of what we will do when we get there. With Harvey and Wheeler a distant memory, Matz rumored done for the season with shoulder and elbow pain, and deGrom missing starts due to inflammation, Syndergaard is the only remaining ace, and even he’s pitching through a bone spur. Neil Walker is out and about to have back surgery, and Cabrera and Cespedes are both playing on-and-off through injuries. Curtis Granderson, despite being my personal favorite, is nonetheless sporting rather less-than-grand 2016 average of .222, projected at .225 for the season. De Aza and Conforto, with a .195 and .217 respectively, don’t instill the greatest confidence either (though Conforto’s Triple-A performance suggests that’s probably not be his fault).

So as much as I love Bartolo, ageless wonder that he is, I don’t think he and Bruce are equipped to make a run for the pennant alone. A seemingly randomized lineup may play well against the Reds, but it’s not going to stick against the best teams in the league. And that’s no shade on the players, either—I wouldn’t expect a group of men who have never practiced nor played together to perform as one on the championship level.

Surrender may be a strong word; of course I want the Mets to keep playing as best they can. But I certainly don’t want them to continue playing their best players through injury such that they are broken next year, or maybe even indefinitely. The myriad injuries of last year’s NLCS contingent suggest the long season took a heavy toll. To that end, I think the Giants’ clinching of pennants in 2010, 2012, and 2014 is more than coincidence—it’s a model for success.

I love the Mets, and I love watching them win, but I’d be happier to see them lose if it means a healthier, more productive team in 2017. I wasn’t yet alive the last time the Mets won the World Series; I can wait another year. Baseball, after all, takes just as long as it needs to.

Photo Credit: Noah K. Murray-USA TODAY Sports