Last week I heard an interview on XM MLB with Pirates GM Neal Huntington, whose Pittsburgh club is finally threatening to assemble a winning record — which would be the first time since Barry Bonds left town in 1992 (no kidding – the Bucs have had 19 straight losing seasons). Because the team is hovering around .500, there is excitement, and Huntington was asked if he believed the Pirates were peaking or could improve upon their current record before the year was over. Huntington was optimistic, theorizing that his team had a good chance to perform even better because no one was “playing over their head”; thus, there was room for improvement.

An interesting theory, and I’m not sure that it has any legs. But it’s intriguing, and since the Mets game was rained out yesterday, we need to discuss something. So let’s apply that concept to the Mets: could they be better than their current record, based on the idea that no one is playing “over their head”? Or, are there players who have played over their head and helped the team to a better won-loss record than we’re likely to see once we get through 162 games?

Let’s go over each pertinent player on the Mets roster and try to figure it out. Continue reading →