FanGraphs Weekly Mailbag: January 24, 2026
At this time last week, the Mets were celebrating their signing of Bo Bichette. Up until that point, though, their offseason was largely being viewed as a letdown as they assembled an oddly shaped roster. Earlier this winter, they watched as Edwin Díaz spurned them for the Dodgers, let Pete Alonso walk and then signed Jorge Polanco to play first base, and missed out on Kyle Tucker. Sure, they upgraded at second base with the Marcus Semien trade, but doing so required them to part with Brandon Nimmo, who was coming off a year in which he hit a career-high 25 home runs and posted 3.0 WAR. They decided to replace that production with 23-year-old Top 100 prospect Carson Benge, who had a 53 wRC+ in 103 Triple-A plate appearances last season, as the big spoon of a platoon in left field. They also reinforced their bullpen with two of the more inconsistent members of the 2025 Yankees’ relief corps, Devin Williams and Luke Weaver. These weren’t bad moves, to be clear. Williams especially is a strong bounce-back candidate; Polanco is a quality player, though his entire experience at first base consists of one defensive plate appearance; and Semien fulfills the team’s desire to get better defensively. But they were a bit puzzling given that the Mets’ greatest areas of need were another impact bat, a center fielder, and a frontline starting pitcher.
As it turns out, adding Bichette was just the first in a trio of acquisitions to address those major roster holes. Late Tuesday night, the Mets traded for center fielder Luis Robert Jr., who is coming off two straight seasons of injuries and poor performance but is still a tantalizing talent and just 28 years old. “If you made an outfielder in a lab, he’d look a lot like this,” wrote Ben Clemens about Robert after the trade. Then, on Wednesday, they swung a swap with the Brewers for All-Star right-hander Freddy Peralta to anchor their rotation. They had to give up two of their top prospects to get him, but as Davy Andrews noted in his column on the trade, “the Mets are trying to win this season, and now that he’s not in Milwaukee, David Stearns has the luxury of leaving tomorrow’s problems for tomorrow.”
We won’t be answering any questions about the Mets or any of the other big recent transactions, such as Cody Bellinger’s re-signing with the Yankees or the Rangers’ trade for MacKenzie Gore, but we will be talking about the other big baseball topic of the week: the Hall of Fame. We’ll also discuss the best left-on-left hitters of all time, the aesthetic potential of the Colorado Rockies, and what to expect from Foster Griffin with the Nationals. But first, I’d like to remind you that this mailbag is exclusive to FanGraphs Members. If you aren’t yet a Member and would like to keep reading, you can sign up for a Membership here. It’s the best way to both experience the site and support our staff, and it comes with a bunch of other great benefits. Also, if you’d like to ask a question for an upcoming mailbag, send me an email at mailbag@fangraphs.com.
Matt is the associate editor of FanGraphs. Previously, he was the baseball editor at Sports Illustrated. His work has appeared in The New York Times, Men’s Health, Baseball Prospectus, and Lindy’s Sports Magazine. Follow him on Twitter @ByMattMartell and Blue Sky @mattmartell.bsky.social.
“By comparison, the spread from the highest median JAWS (third base, 57.3) and the lowest (left field, 47.8) is 9.5 points, a gap I consider unwieldy.” –Jaffe.
That’s fascinating. And disturbing. Certainly implies that 3rd basemen have been getting short shrift from hall voters. I was never much of a Graig Nettles or Buddy Bell fan, but I think I better reconsider.
Second and third base have a handful of omissions. The two that I think about most are Ken Boyer and Bobby Grich. I think because they’re both pretty well-rounded.
A pretty good crop is coming up though. At second base, Utley is very likely to make it in at this point, and Altuve also seems likely to get in. At third base both Jose Ramirez and Manny Machado seem like decent bets to get in.
I think you could make an argument for Nettles pretty easily, and maybe Bell too but Arenado seems like he’s as strong a candidate as Bell.
Lou Whitaker
There should be an influx in the somewhat near future at least, given that we’ve had something of a Golden Generation of 3B. Ramirez and Arenado are probably locks, with Longoria close behind, particularly as the older group of voters thankfully age out. Bregman can reach the 7 yr peak average with a 6 win season this year (although I’d personally bet against that).
Donaldson and Machado both look a little short, especially given that they’re aren’t exactly the most well-liked guys around
Machado looks a little short?
Compared to Longoria, haha?
Manny Machado, who leads active 3Bs in JAWS (over 60 and over 40), has cracked 2K hits, figures to pass 400 HR this year or next, and is coming off a 4 WAR season?
I think you can swap over Machado and Arenado. Machado is still putting up good, above average seasons – he has more hits and homers than Arenado, and didn’t spend most of his career in Coors. Ramirez needs to age ok – he’s still been a great player, and a couple of average seasons probably put him over the top (I think he’ll be much better than that, but age comes for us all) – though he is very light on the traditional counting stats at the moment, I think the advanced stats guys will (rightly) love him, and vote him in.
I think Ramirez is going to sail in. If his career was over today he would be very borderline. But he put up 6+ wins the last two seasons and he is now another 6 (maybe 7?) years under contract. You take a standard discount of 0.5 WAR and he will be in the range of guys like Beltre, George Brett, and Chipper Jones. If you take him from his Steamer projection this year he will still have better numbers than Rolen. And he will be a one team guy. I think he’s probably got a better shot of being a Hall of Famer than Bryce Harper and Bryce Harper is almost certainly a Hall of Famer.
I completely agree, but he is 33 and sometimes guys don’t age gradually, instead it comes all at once.
I hope he keeos playing well – the extension should be good for him and good for the Guardians.