Edgy MD wrote: The future is all hope and promises. At best. Nothing there is concrete. "Hope is not a strategy." Steve Cohen, himself. More on the Mets likely pursuit of Ohtani from The Athletic: Rosenthal: If Mets sell at trade deadline, options range from the obvious to the extreme Excerpt: One other point to consider: If the Mets are serious about landing Shohei Ohtani -- and with Cohen, why wouldn't they be? -- they will need to present the two-way sensation with a coherent vision of how they intend to win. A five year plan is not going to entice Ohtani, and Cohen also wants no part of such a thing, having said upon taking over as owner in Nov. 2020 that he expected a championship in 3 to 5 years. [***] Ohtani would not want to join this version of the Mets, not when he will have other lucrative options. __________ Also: If aging Mets are bad now, what does it mean for 2024? βNot a great place to be' Excerpt: NEW YORK β A losing season reverberates, its consequences rippling out into the future in ways unpredictable. For the Mets, their wholly disappointing first half of 2023, which continued in a 5-2 loss to the Brewers Wednesday, doesn't just limit their chances to play October baseball this season. It also calls into question their long-term roster construction and the strategy that led to it. New York is already the oldest team in baseball, and most of that age is slated to return next season. The Mets are paying players 32 and older roughly $186 million this season (not counting salaries for Robinson CanΓ³ and James McCann). They're already scheduled to pay such players $153 million next year. If that core looks like this in 2023, should they expect it to be any better in 2024? βIf it turns out we don't improve, and we're looking at '24, let's say we're with a similar team and one year older, for a veteran team, that's probably not a great place to be,β owner Steve Cohen said during his wide-ranging press conference on Wednesday. βI mean, it could get better. But it may not. We have to make those judgments.β https://theathletic.com/4650402/2023/06/29/mets-struggles-2024-roster/https://theathletic.com/4650402/2023/06/29/mets-struggles-2024-roster/