It’s a funny thing about the New York Mets: they can make a blockbuster trade, land a superstar shortstop, watch him put up All-Star numbers, and still find a way to be left staring at the October party from the sidewalk. That’s where Andres Gimenez, once just a promising infield prospect, enters the chat with a statistic that Mets fans might wish didn’t exist.

While Francisco Lindor has delivered every ounce of star power promised, Gimenez has somehow logged more playoff games, first in Cleveland and now in Toronto, than Lindor has in Flushing. It’s not a knock on Lindor, who’s been worth every cheer, but rather a reminder of the bigger story. The Mets didn’t lose the trade. They just haven’t built a winning stage around their marquee actor.

More October for Andres Giménez highlights how the Mets fell short after the trade

The trade that sent Lindor and Carrasco to New York was supposed to be the Mets’ ticket to the next level. In January 2021, the deal included Ahmed Rosario, Andres Gimenez, and two minor league prospects. The Mets didn’t just stop at acquiring Lindor—they followed up by signing him to a 10-year, $341 million contract, making it clear he wasn’t going anywhere soon. On paper, this was a franchise-defining move, a signal that the Mets were all-in on building around a true superstar.

And yet, the results since the trade tell a story that isn’t quite so clean. Gimenez, included in that very same deal, has appeared in 17 postseason games since leaving the Mets’ orbit—first with Cleveland and now he’s about to add on with Toronto, who is about to square off with the Yankees in the Division Series. Lindor, dazzling as he’s been in Flushing, has played in 16 playoff games in that same span. That tiny gap isn’t about who’s better or who deserves more credit; it’s a reminder that while the Mets won the trade hands down, they haven’t managed to construct a team that consistently delivers when it matters most.

It’s a subtle frustration for fans who expected Lindor’s arrival to usher in a string of October appearances. Instead, the Mets haven’t built a complete, consistently winning team around him. They made a quick exit in the 2022 Wild Card series and reached the NLCS in 2024, but missed the playoffs entirely in 2021, 2023, and again this year.

Winning the trade doesn’t automatically mean postseason success. The Mets’ record since 2021 reflects that tension: flashes of brilliance but without the roster depth and construction needed to turn Lindor’s star power into sustained October runs.

In other words, the Mets’ headline move worked—it got them a superstar—but the building around him hasn’t. The stat line with Gimenez merely underscores it: the Mets may have the centerpiece, but the supporting cast is still a work in progress. And until that team construction catches up, Lindor’s brilliance can’t fully translate into the consistent postseason runs fans were promised.