New York Mets Should Consider Selling as MLB Trade Deadline Approaches

With apologies to the Bard of Avon, be a seller, not a buyer.  As the Major League Baseball trade deadline approaches, that's my advice to the New York Mets.

Come two weeks from today, on Tuesday July 31st, the Mets ought to trade whoever they can from their current roster and ready themselves for next year. That's because their unexpected run to respectability, not to mention a possible playoff spot, is dead in the water for 2012.

Mind you, I didn't feel this way last Friday.

Going into the series with the Atlanta Braves last Friday, I thought that the Metropolitans were primed and ready to play the same kind of scrappy, overachieving baseball that had netted them a surprising 46-40 win-loss record going into the All-Star break.

Was I concerned that they had lost two of three to the woeful Chicago Cubs during that July 6-8 weekend series at Citifield? Sure, but I chalked it up to the famous get-out-of-town factor. The players' heads were elsewhere. I mean, the Sunday July 8th game was played in a fast time of 2:08. They had planes to catch and loved ones to see.

Refreshed and revigorated from their four-day hiatus, I figured they'd be pumped and excited about the final 76 games on the schedule. A playoff spot, I reasoned, was only 44 games away. Win 44 of 76, I told myself, and you'll have at least a wild-card spot to crow about.

Well, here they are now at 46-43, and now I have doubts about them finishing even with a .500 record.

Ah, how quickly things change.

Listen, I'd love for them to get back in the playoff hunt, but I've thought this through. And it's not pretty.

Including today's game with the Washington Nationals, the Mets have 33 games remaining against their own division, the National League East. Assuming they split those contests, that takes their win total up to 62 or 63. That means they'd need to take 27 or 28 out of 40 from the following teams they still have to play outside of their division: the Dodgers, the Giants, the Diamondbacks, the Brewers, the Pirates, the Cardinals, the Padres, the Rockies, the Astros and the Reds.

And if you think this team can do that, I've got a bridge in Brooklyn to sell you.

Look, I hope I'm wrong. Heck, I grew up 10 minutes from the old Shea Stadium. The Mets have been my team ever since my late father took me to my first game in 1967.

But let's all the do the math. It's time to start retooling and rebuilding. 

We'd all love to trade Jason Bay, but that's not happening. The way I figure it, Scott Hairston, Tim Byrdak and Jon Rauch are the only assets this club has that it can afford to part with. And the Mets certainly aren't going to part with Bobby Parnell.

So to all you Mets fans out there, I say wait till next year. It was a fun ride while it lasted.