As Promised, The Mets Have Spent Money This Winter

The Mets shocked their fan base by signing Bartolo Colon to a 2 year, 20 million dollar contract. This is coming on the heals of the Mets introducing Curtis Granderson as a member of the team. Don't forget, the Mets also signed Chris Young to a 7.25 million dollar contract. By my calculations, the Mets have committed 30.25 million dollars toward 2014. The Mets said they were going to spend this off-season, and they have. 

Love the moves or hate the moves, you have to be happy the Mets are back to writing checks. All of these players have their flaws. Young and Granderson strike out a lot. Colon is 40 years old. But these are all high reward, low risk move. Sure, it's a lot of money. But Young is only a 1 year commitment. Colon is only 2. Granderson, 4 years. None of these deals are contracts that will handcuff the team from spending in the future.

More importantly, this Mets team is better than they were on October 1st. And I think it's better by a lot. I know everyone is going to point to Harvey being injured and Byrd being gone and say I'm nuts. That's fine. But look at it this way. You have 4 solid starting pitchers, which is more than you had on opening day last year. You can slot Mejia into the 5th spot. If he pitches anything like he did last year (and more importantly stays healthy) then you have a rotation that top to bottom is deep and will be competitive. There's also Montero and Syndergaard, who are expected to make contributions this season.

The line-up is a big if, but it has the potential to be fairly solid.  You know what you're going to get from Wright, Granderson, Murphy and Young.  The success of this team is going to come down to the development of Travis d'Arnaud, Juan Legares and whoever is playing first base next season.  If d'Arnaud develops into the player he is projected to be, and Legares improves upon what he did last season, then that really changes the complexion of this line-up.  You really need Duda or Davis to wake the hell up.

The Mets still have some glaring holes.  Shortstop is still very uncertain.  The really lack solid arms in the bullpen.  The Mets may not have another dime to spend this off season.  But it doesn't matter.  They have made some acquisitions and put themselves in position to be more competitive in 2014.  Maybe this will lead to more revenue, and then more money can be spent to keep building this team for the future. Either way, I'm just happy they're spending again