Mets turned down Edwin Diaz trade, banking on turnaround

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Part nine in a series about the New York Mets The Mets could have traded Edwin Diaz in the offseason, but that move would have been riskier than trying to resurrect the underperforming reliever. After all, general manager Brodie Van Wagenen surrendered the organization’s top prospect, Jarred Kelenic, in the deal to get Diaz from …

Part nine in a series about the New York Mets

The Mets could have traded Edwin Diaz in the offseason, but that move would have been riskier than trying to resurrect the underperforming reliever.

After all, general manager Brodie Van Wagenen surrendered the organization’s top prospect, Jarred Kelenic, in the deal to get Diaz from the Mariners before last season. Unloading Diaz and then watching him resume elsewhere as an All-Star would turn an already potentially brutal trade into an inferno.

Diaz’s arsenal and track record suggest he’s worthy of another shot in the closer’s role. But the Mets also need a backup plan in case the right-hander’s 2019 troubles persist.

“The two things that make a closer successful: No. 1 is makeup — you can’t have any fear or memory — and the other thing is control, command,” a talent evaluator from a National League club said. “I saw Diaz pitch a lot last year and everything was there, it’s just his location was terrible. He was throwing pitches right down Broadway and I go back to another thing: When you are in trouble you go softer, not harder, and I think Diaz would just rev it up and try to throw one pitch harder than the other.”

In 66 appearances last season, Diaz went 2-7 with a 5.59 ERA and seven blown saves, surrendering 15 homers over 58 innings. He was demoted from the closer’s role late in the season, as the Mets turned to Seth Lugo and Justin Wilson in the ninth inning.

“We could talk about [Armando] Benitez and a lot of guys that had a lot of ability that just couldn’t do it,” the evaluator said, referring to the Mets closer from the late 1990s and early 2000s. “A lot of guys just have mental blocks, and a little bit of the problems [Diaz] was having probably even built up in his head a little bit even more. He didn’t make any adjustments. He was just, ‘I am going to throw as hard as I can and can you [hit] that now?’ ”

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The 26-year-old Diaz was the centerpiece of the deal that also brought Robinson Cano to the Mets, sending Kelenic, Justin Dunn, Jay Bruce, Anthony Swarzak and Gerson Bautista to the Mariners. Kelenic, who finished last season at Double-A, is a five-tool center fielder whom the Mets selected in the first round of the 2018 draft. Diaz was an All-Star his final season with the Mariners, in which he finished with a 1.96 ERA and 0.791 WHIP with a major-league leading 57 saves.

In an attempt to salvage Diaz, the Mets sent a nutritionist to the pitcher’s home in Puerto Rico this offseason and started him on a new workout routine. After listening to offers for Diaz at last year’s trade deadline, Van Wagenen took him off the market over the winter.

“I would want him because I think he is going to be good,” the talent evaluator said. “And if you look at the way relief pitchers are up and down from year to year that even gives you a little more confidence in saying he can come back from it. He’s healthy, he has done it before, he is still young. I think he has value from when they got him.”

Once MLB returns from the COVID-19 shutdown, whether that is this summer or next year, Diaz will be among the most scrutinized Mets players. If he again falters, the Mets will have to consider other options, including Lugo, Jeurys Familia and Dellin Betances.

“We have a lot of individuals that can do that,” manager Luis Rojas said shortly before spring training was suspended in March. “We could also have a committee with the guys we have in our bullpen just based on their track history. But we’re not defining roles.”