Seeing Reasons for Mets’ Optimism, by Squinting

 So here we are again, the Mets perched on that cliff wall of possibility.

Despite stumbling for months with several regulars hitting at or below .200 — the player equivalent of walking pneumonia — despite having their superb young pitching ace in recovery from elbow reconstruction, despite displaying the colorings of that baseball subspecies Deeply Mediocurus, the Mets sit within hailing distance of the playoffs.

Sort of. On the day after a win. If your eyesight isn’t so hot.

As if to punctuate that point, the Mets, after flirting with being no-hit on Saturday evening, almost went all in on Sunday, getting no-hit until the eighth inning by Odrisamer Despaigne, a young Svengali of a San Diego pitcher making his fifth career start in the major leagues. The Mets eventually tied the game but lost it in the ninth.

Before the All-Star break, the Mets had scampered to five games shy of .500. The baby-faced catcher Travis d’Arnaud and the bearlike first baseman Lucas Duda were stroking the ball. The young pitching staff had its hiccups, as Zack Wheeler in particular commingled the exhilarating and the clueless, but it offered far more hope than not.

So what’s not to feel vaguely encouraged about? Until, that is, the Mets arrived in San Diego. After winning the first game, they suffered two losses in a row to the worst-hitting team of the last century.

For those devoted to the fellowship of the Mets — I donned that hair shirt in the late 1960s — this feels familiar, hope followed by a chaser of despair. It is likely to accentuate the plight of Mets General Manager Sandy Alderson.

Alderson has played dime ball in a big-bill city. Now he confronts a test as the trade deadline approaches: Does he trade for someone, anyone, who can swing a bat? Or does he again play garage sale and sell off a plump and aging starter — Bartolo Colon, please report to the courtesy desk — for some talented kid in Class AA?

Alderson has taken refuge in the opaque. “I think the last 10 games were important because they make the next 10 games relevant,” he told reporters a few nights ago.

O.K.

A veteran baseball man cut to the underlying reality: “Do you really play it to be a seller for the fourth year in a row? Well, wow. That’s tough.”

Alderson could deal a couple of talented kid pitchers for, say, a first-class shortstop. But that would require the Mets’ owners, the Wilpons, to spend money. And this once free-spending family has yet to recover from the shock of discovering that its financial adviser Bernard L. Madoff, who promised an endless sunrise of double-digit returns, was a world-class scoundrel and con artist.

It should be noted that the Mets have made no genius of deadline trades. Two decades ago, the Mets dealt twin live wires, reliever Roger McDowell and outfielder Lenny Dykstra, for Juan Samuel, a nice-looking five-tool player who upon arrival at Shea Stadium did a career header. In more recent memory, they gave up the future ace Scott Kazmir for that pair of pitching immortals Victor Zambrano and Bartolome Fortunato.

Excuse me while I curl into a fetal position.

This weekend underlined the Mets’ underlying conundrum: Was their recent streak for real? As my colleague Billy Witz pointed out, the Mets often clamber up this path. In 2010 and 2012, they were 48-40 and 46-40. Then the calendar turned to August, and the Mets lost their toeholds and tumbled down the rock face of the standings.

To arrive in San Diego was to find the Mets perhaps more realistic than their fans, who sustain themselves by scouring astrological charts for signs of a turnaround. A 162-game season imposes a degree of Zen. Losses will happen, period.

You wandered up to David Wright as he coached Juan Lagares through a game of cards before Saturday’s game. Feeling optimistic? “You’re obviously aware of what we did; we have been playing good baseball,” Wright said. “But it’s a humbling game.” He paused, then added, “Baseball can bite you again.”

You put the question to Manager Terry Collins. Buy or sell? He was not stepping on that Claymore mine. “I will tell you, these discussions, Sandy is pretty smart. I don’t go into those. It’s pretty much a one-way discussion.”

Collins sat in a spare dorm room of an office, a lone Vincent van Gogh print on the wall. He steepled his hands and talked in staccato aphorisms.

Had d’Arnaud rediscovered his swing? “Where we didn’t get production, we’re getting production.”

Was Lagares going to play regularly? “He is today. This game is about today.”

More questions, banter, his eyes darted warily, like a colonel confronted with a brigade of second-guessers. “I wish I was smart enough to worry about all the things you guys think I should worry about.”

Back in the locker room, you spotted reason for optimism: Jenrry Mejia. Despite the Mets’ best efforts to derail his career, promoting him too early, shifting him from starting to relieving and back again, blowing out his elbow, he has embraced his role as the top relief pitcher.

Being a closer is like stepping daily in front of a firing squad. Asked about this, he shrugged. He shined shoes in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, until he was 15. He likes to throw. And he’s not hedging. He said a few days ago, “We’re going to win it.”

He repeated that when I asked him. “Yah, man, going to win. Simple.” He smiled, giggled and pulled down a pair of firehouse red earphones over his thick mat of hair. He toggled among video games and texts and photos. He began to laugh out loud and sang, atonally.

Mejia did not get into the game Saturday or Sunday. On Saturday, the Mets fell behind early as the spectacularly weak-hitting Padres somehow stroked a few long home runs.

Collins tried to shrug off the Saturday loss. When he was asked about pinch-hitting for starter Dillon Gee after five innings, his eyes narrowed. “I don’t know what league people play in. You’re down 4-0. ...”

You wonder how the manager would handle second-guessing if his team played meaningful September games. You wonder what Alderson sees with his appraising eyes. And you wonder if this young, perhaps promising team can avoid a long August tumble.