What, Exactly, Are We Learning Here?

One of the Mets 1,034 general managers spoke today about how the Mets are going to go about the rest of this season:

Mets assistant general manager John Ricco says he expects the Mets to be competitive in 2019. Here, he discusses what the front office plans to evaluate over the next two months: pic.twitter.com/T2ob5iBkO7

— Anthony DiComo (@AnthonyDiComo) August 2, 2018

“We have to collectively look at our position players.” Right off the bat. Supposedly, that includes Jose Reyes, who was in the lineup at shortstop on Thursday night after his two home runs on Wednesday afternoon.

Wait … Jose Reyes? Shortstop?

I must've missed this, but Callaway said he wants to give Rosario 2 days off a week.

— Matt Ehalt (@MattEhalt) August 2, 2018

Yes. Rest those old bones. Good strategy. And keep in mind that back in February, this is what Mickey Callaway had to say about Amed Rosario:

Callaway on Rosario: “Unbelievable athlete. Right on par with Lindor.”

— Steve Gelbs (@SteveGelbs) February 14, 2018

“Unbelievable athlete.” “Right on par with Lindor”, who has played in 522 out of a possible 531 games in his career, and started 517 of them. Lindor has completely missed 14 games out of 531. Amed Rosario is going to miss 16 games in the next 56 because … well I don’t know why. But don’t ever compare him to Frankie Lindor again if he’s going to miss two out of every seven games despite the fact that he’s an unbelievable athlete.

Via the Mets: Luis Guillorme has not struck out in his last 49 plate appearances, the longest active streak in the majors.

— Tim Healey (@timbhealey) August 3, 2018

Clearly he needs to be on the bench too.

So basically, in the next two months where “we have to collectively look at our position players”, we are looking at Jose Reyes playing shortstop like it’s 2003, Jose Bautista playing right field like it’s 2011, and Todd Frazier striking out every ninth inning like clockwork. Not to mention Kevin Plawecki, who I’m sure everybody is getting ready to start the mental gymnastics on in September after his batting averages rises from .231 to .239 because some AA pitcher that the Marlins call up throws meatballs during the last weekend of the season and everybody starts screaming about Plawecki’s momentum for 2019.Can we not do this for one year? Please?

(By the way, and I just looked this up, that AA reliever for the Marlins could be a guy named Lukas Schiraldi. And yes … there’s a relation.)

And don’t get me started on the pitching, where we’re going to be subject to Jason Vargas every five days until we find a way to unload him so he can go to the Nationals next season and throw a gem against us because the Mets have to keep up weekly appearances on Deadspin. Vargas had a 14.40 ERA in the first inning, and it went down after giving up just one run. Then he gave up three in the fourth and I had to hear Nelson Figueroa talk about how he just had the one bad inning out of five in a 4-2 loss. Awesome. 2019 is looking better and better already. We’re really learning a lot about everybody, and we have a ton of international slot money which I’m sure we’ll use on Cuban cigars and Lindt truffles.

Let’s bring Ty Kelly back up. We clearly don’t know enough about him.

Today’s Hate List

1. Adam Eaton
2. Chase Utley
3. The other Adam Eaton
4. Kyle Barraclough
5. Kevin Gausman