Hartsock

Notes and observations as the Major League Baseball playoffs heat up and compete with football for TV remote clicks:

– It’s hard to believe that the New York Mets, who boast the second-largest payroll among all 30 MLB teams at over $342 million in 2025, are watching this year’s postseason games from the comfort of their living rooms.

The Mets –who paid designated hitter Juan Soto an unprecedented $765 million over 15 years to leave the cross-town Yankees last offseason — collapsed in the second half of this season, winning only 38 of their final 93 games after reaching June 12 with a major-league best 45-24 record and a 5 ½ game National League East Division lead over the eventual division champion Philadelphia Phillies.

The Mets wound up the season in second place in the division, 13 games behind the Phillies, with an 83-79 record that matched the sixth-seeded NL playoff team, the Cincinnati Reds. But the Reds earned the league’s final postseason berth by virtue of winning the season series with the Mets, four games to two.

This season was a colossal failure for the Mets, prompting team owner Steve Cohen to issue a public apology to Mets fans after the season ended.

It also goes to show that throwing the most money toward a championship run doesn’t always work out for the best.

– That said, the well-heeled, large-market teams do possess an overall edge on what is far from a level financial playing field. Of the teams with the top five payrolls in baseball this season, only the Mets are sitting out the playoffs. The defending World Champion Los Angeles Dodgers have a payroll of over $350 million, which is the largest in MLB. The Yankees are third at over $300 million, the Phillies are fourth at over $290 million, and the Toronto Blue Jays are fifth at over $255 million.

Teams that can spend more money and dominate the free agent market also enjoy a greater margin for error with their signings and trade acquisitions.

– There’s an intriguing battle going on for the American League’s Most Valuable Player Award, which will be announced in November. It figures to come down to either Seattle Mariners catcher Cal Raleigh, or New York Yankees superstar Aaron Judge.

Raleigh helped the Mariners win the American League West Division title this year by belting a league-leading 60 regular-season home runs and driving in a league-best 125 runs. Judge boasted a league-best .331 batting average, was second to Raleigh in the league in home runs with 53, and third in the league in RBIs with 114 behind Raleigh and Seattle’s Eugenio Suarez (118).

A compelling argument in Raleigh’s favor is that he has been able to achieve his gaudy power numbers while playing 159 of 162 regular-season games at the most physically demanding and one of the most responsible positions on the playing field.

– It’s not a coincidence that the Reds made the playoffs this year in Terry Francona’s first year as their manager this season. Although their stay was short — a three-game first-round ouster at the hands of the Dodgers in Los Angeles — the Reds qualified for the playoffs in a full season for the first time since 2013, and Francona extended his marvelous future Hall of Fame managerial legacy that has seen him produce winning results at every place that he has been.

– The Milwaukee Brewers and their manager Pat Murphy just keep plugging along. The Brewers were expected to take a step back this season, after losing power-hitting shortstop Willy Adames to free agency last offseason, and facing several question marks on their starting pitching staff. Instead, Milwaukee won its third consecutive NL Central title and grabbed the top seed in the NL playoffs after posting a regular-season best 97 victories.

Murphy — whose daughter is married to former Pittsburgh Pirates slugger Pedro Alvarez — was named the National League Manager of the Year in 2024, and there’s a good chance that he can earn that award again when it is announced in November.

The Brewers never do anything fancy, but year after year, they field a very balanced and productive starting lineup — albeit one that includes several players who aren’t yet household names — and flawlessly execute the fundamentals like playing good defense and moving runners from station to station on the basepaths.

Their pitching has also been excellent this year, as evidenced by the overall staff’s NL-best 3.59 earned run average.

The Brewers — whose payroll of just over $121 million ranks them only 22nd out of the 30 MLB teams — have provided an excellent role model for what small-market teams with limited budgets need to do in order to succeed.

John Hartsock can be reached at jhartsock@altoonamirror.com