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• The Mets signed LHP Richard Lovelady to a one-year major league contract
• Francisco Lindor recently underwent an elbow debridement – he is expected to be ready for Spring Training?
• The Mets interviewed Troy Snitker, who was recently fired by the Astros, for one of their open hitting coach positions (NY Post)

If the Mets are going to improve their overall run prevention ability this winter, they need to get better up the middle.

The most obvious area of need and perhaps the easiest to fix on the external markets is in center field, a position David Stearns thought he had addressed between Tyrone Taylor and José Siri heading into the season, and with Cedric Mullins at the trade deadline.

Needless to say, the Mets got nearly nothing offensively from their center fielders in 2025, and the acquisition of Mullins not only didn’t help them offensively, but it made them a whole lot worse defensively.

At the plate, the Mets produced 71 wRC+ at the position, which was the fourth worst mark in baseball, as was their .598 OPS. They were worth just 0.7 fWAR, which was the fifth worst mark in the game.

Yeah, it was ugly and that’s just the offense we are talking about.

Their centerfielders had two defensive runs saved (DRS), which was 13th best in baseball and three outs above average (OAA), which was the ninth worst mark in baseball.

So while Taylor unquestionably had a good year at the position for the team defensively (7 DRS, 4 OAA), everyone else watered down the team’s performance out there with their net negative performance in his absence.

So this is an obvious point of emphasis for Stearns once again this winter. The question is, will Stearns once again go for defense and/or a platoon, or will he attempt to make a big splash at this position and get a player who provides significant value on both sides of the ball?

The problem for the Mets was two-pronged at the position, as you can see. The Mets got next to nothing end-to-end this year on either side of the ball from the position, and not only did that impact their run prevention ability, it shortened the lineup and impacted their run production ability as well, leading to a very top-heavy lineup for much of the season and a cavernous hole defensively when Taylor wasn’t playing.

So naturally, I believe the Mets need to think as big as they can here. But unfortunately, the free agent market is a little thin in natural center fielders.

Cody Bellinger, Harrison Bader, Mike Yastrzemski, and Trent Grisham are the headliners this winter. And, there’s really no other options aside from Cedric Mullins, who I would assume is not an option the Mets will consider.

I’ll discuss each of these four players today.

If there was any doubt Bellinger was essentially a one-hit wonder with the Dodgers, that is all in the past. He has been worth 11.4 fWAR over the last three seasons and has averaged 24 home runs and 91 RBI during that span. He has played in 130 or more games in each of those seasons as well, and outside of the 2021 season, he has played in 132 games or more in all eight of his 162-game seasons. He’s been a durable presence with the Dodgers, Cubs, and Yankees throughout his nine-year career and has a three-way skillset of power, speed, and defense, all things the Mets need here.

He is a versatile outfielder, capable of playing all three positions on an everyday basis. He is unquestionably a better corner outfielder than he is a center fielder, as he posted above-average marks in the corners while slightly below-average marks in center field this past season.

He can and probably will opt out of the final year of his three-year, $80 million deal after the World Series and take a $5 million buyout, which will raise his 2025 salary to a total of $32.5 million. He will turn 31 next July. So, it’s easy to assume Bellinger will seek a 6-7-year deal in the $30-31 million per season range.

There are a couple of questions with Bellinger.

First off, how much will the park factor be in play to sway Bellinger to leave the Yankees? Second, can Bellinger play center field on a regular basis, and if so, for how much longer given his age? They can install him in the corners on occasion to give both Juan Soto and Brandon Nimmo DH time or days off and not skip a beat (and be better defensively when they do that in the process), but the Mets would presumably bring Bellinger in to solve their problem in center field more than anywhere else while lengthening the lineup.

So yes, Bellinger is the best available player to solve the problem, but it’s not an easy fit as it might have originally seemed.

It’s worth mentioning Bellinger is not tied to draft pick compensation if he leaves the Yankees since he already received a qualifying offer from the Cubs two years ago.

It’s not certain Bader will become a free agent since he has a $10 million mutual option with the Phillies. He’s coming off a career year which would seemingly make it more likely for him to decline his side of the option and seek a multi-year deal in free agency. But, who knows especially with a lockout in 2027 looming over the game.

The Mets know Bader, of course, he’s from the area and he could be a fit once again as he was two winters ago. But is he capable of reproducing what he did for the Twins and Phillies this season? History would say no, and he is somewhere in between what he was in 2025 and the rest of his career, which is a part-time, plus-defending outfield who is a league-average to slightly below offensive player.

He was worth 3.2 fWAR in 2025 while hitting .277/.347/.449 with 17 home runs and 54 RBI with the Twins and Phillies, all well above his career marks with the exception of 2018 when he was worth 3.7 fWAR with the Cardinals in his age-24 season.

Yastrzemski is entering free agency for the first time after his age-34 season. He was a late rookie, coming up with the Giants in 2019 in his age-28 season.

I’d venture to say the Mets will look elsewhere since his best outfield position is right field, and he is league average in center. He does have decent power and can at least provide league-average production offensively, but given how he profiles at this stage of his career, Yastrzemski doesn’t look like a fit for what the Mets are trying to accomplish with their offense or defense in the near term, even if he can be had cheaper than Bellinger and perhaps Bader as well.

Yastrzemski was worth 2.4 fWAR in 2025 while hitting .233/.333/.403 with 17 home runs and 68 RBI in 147 games with the Giants and Royals. He earned $9.25 million in his final year of arbitration.

Grisham picked the right year to have his best year of his career.

The Yankees got Grisham along with Soto before the 2024 season, and while he had his moments last year in their run to the World Series, he was well below league average offensively. But not so in 2025 as he doubled his career-best home run output from 2022 and hit 34 home runs with a 125 OPS+ in his second season with the Yankees.

But while Grisham had a big year offensively, he was a mess defensively in center field. Based on his track record, that appears to be an anomaly as he had been a league-average to a little bit above in 2023-2024 and a plus defender from 2019-2022.

So, he could conceivably bounce back defensively in 2026. But how much will his offense regress into what was something which was less than what they had this year?

As such, Grisham probably isn’t the best fit for the Mets, either.

Grisham was worth 3.2 fWAR in 2025 while hitting .235/.348/.464 with 34 home runs and 74 RBI in 143 games with the Yankees. He earned $5 million in the final year of his arbitration eligibility. He doesn’t appear to be a qualifying offer candidate this fall.