This week we saw the arrival–and departure–of reliever Tyson Miller, becoming the first Met since Seth Lugo and the second overall to wear No. 67. We also witnessed the debut appearance of Sam Coonrod wearing No. 45. Coonrod spent the whole year injured.
The real action happened on Twitter where a mystery popped up over the Met pictured below in the No. 55 jersey in a 1984 Old Timers Game. He looks facially like Bill Monbouquette even though Bill wore 54 and wasn’t on the Mets’ staff in 1984.
@Springer66 Do you have any guesses who this number 55 might be? It's from an old timer's game in Denver in July 1984. George H.W. Bush is at left and Tony Oliva is at right. Frank Howard would've been wearing 55 for the Mets at the time but that doesn't look like him. pic.twitter.com/l9eNpLJhBZ
— Dennis C. Abrams (@DennisCAbrams) August 16, 2023
In some ways that was a more radical teardown than even I anticipated. For a time I was hoping to keep Justin Verlander in the hopes that he, Kodai Senga and Jose Quintana could be the start of a decent rotation for 2024. He got us two promising hitters instead. And how about that Dominic Leone trade? This was a guy we got off the trash heap in May and he brought back the Angels’ No. 9 prospect.
The problem with all this in-season wheeling and dealing is we’re left with a club that can’t beat the Royals. Thanks the the depletions of Tommy Pham and Mark Canha we’re running out palookas like Rafael Ortega (30) and Jonathan Arauz (19). We have new dudes in the bullpen I’ve hardly ever heard of like Reed Garrett (75) and Phil Bickford (50).
I’ll miss David Robertson and his reliable socks more than I’ll ever miss Max Scherzer and his reliable gopherballs.
Up from Syracuse to take Max’s place is Vinny Nottoli. Reed Garrett, No. 75, replaced Robertson.
I know I’ve been running behind schedule but I didn’t think I’d miss the entire Gary Sanchez Era. The Mets solved the problem of too many catchers today and designated the former Yankee for assignment. We’ve got to stop giving catchers No. 33, it did so little for James McCann.
Tomas Nido is back but he’s not about to be the starter any longer now that Francisco Alvarez has settled in. He’s pretty good. Brett Baty isn’t bad either though he may be having his first Big League slump. Mark Vientos? His swing looks long to me and I’m afraid he’s going to strike out too much. I’m a little scared to pull the plug on Tommy Pham yet.
I was in the stadium when Josh Walker made his first and still only appearance as a Met. He became the first 91 since Carlos Gomez broke it in in his brief return to the Mets in 2019.
A flurry of fast-vanishing minor league palookas have inhabited the bullpen lately. We’ve seen Edwin Uceta (64), Zach Muckenhirn (71), and Dominic Leone (50), not to mention emergency starters Jose Butto and Denyi Reyes. Leone appeared so suddenly he beat the transactions column.
While inputting some of these guys I realized I’d neglected to mark the end of their predecessors like RJ Alvarez for Muckenhirn and the unforgettable Nate Fisher for Uceta. Early May seems too soon to be this deep into bullpen depth, but these guys are churning already. Only Leone is still up, now that Tommy Hunter and Stephen Nogosek are back from injury.
As uninspiring his outings have tended to be, losing Carlos Carrasco to elbow problems is not what the Mets needed right now, seeing as they’ve already got two dudes in the rotation who might not have been in the blueprint, since Jose Quintana and Justin Verlander have yet to appear. Is Joey Lucchesi the next to appear? I’m not sure.
Last night (I didn’t stay up to watch) Jeff Brigham made his first Met appearance and struck out the only two guys he faced. Brigham came over in a small offseason trade with the Marlins and has some experience with them. He’s the immediate solution for Carrasco till his turn in the rotation comes up.
A 10-game West Coast road trip has gotten off to a promising start on Oakland although the Mets experienced the first roster churn of the year when Stephen Nogosek went down with an injury and Max Scherzer‘s start was delayed.
Adding Yacobonis to the 40-man roster meant designating the out-of-optins Dennis Santana for assignment; he looked okay to me so hopefully he clears and accepts a Syracuse appointment. Pitching instead of Scherzer this afternoon is Jose Butto who we saw briefly last year wearing No. 70.
Last night if you could bear to watch you saw Max Scherzer give up a buttload of hard hit balls and get relieved by Denyi Reyes, who was making his Mets debut. Reyes was in because Tommy Hunter went to the injured list after himself getting beaten up the day before. Reyes, who was signed as a minor league free agent and has a few innings of MLB experience with the Orioles, was wearing 72, last seen on the back of Jake Reed last season.
As I tend do when these questions come in I check to see what guidance the Mets’ official roster would provide and the answer is often inconclusive. But in this case it’s also weird. The 
As to Narváez it looks like the available numbers are 2, 7, 15, 16, 18, 25, 29, 30, 33, 40, 43, 44, 45, 46, 48, before we get into the 50s. Alvarez may want one of those lower numbers himself. It’d be cool if Narváez gets 15, and Alvarez takes 16, while Escobar stays in 10.
I couldn’t be happier the Mets were able to 
Also on the 40 are brief visitors from last season Bryce Montes de Oca (63), Yoan Lopez (44), and Stephen Nogosek (85). Plus new guys awaiting number assignments: Jeff Brigham, Zach Greene (pinched from the Yankees in Rule 5), Stephen Ridings (waiver claim from the Yankees); Brooks Raley (trade with Tampa Bay), Tayler Saucedo (waiver claim from Toronto), and William Woods (waiver claim from Atlanta).