At the time I said they would miss utility OMG Met Jose Iglesias because of his ability to bring a clubhouse together. Too often the modern POBO, president of baseball operations, does not take into consideration the importance of clubhouse chemistry because their decisions are heavily based on analytics.

The Mets were a fractured clubhouse last season, and I got the feeling all year they were a too cool for school team. They thought they were better than they were and melted in pressure spots. In June they were on top of baseball but folded the rest of the way – and somehow showed no ability to come back by going 0-70 when trailing after eight innings.

Juan Soto has the crazy 15-year, $765 million contract, but, to me, no Met has more pressure on him in 2026 than $341 million shortstop Francisco Lindor. The Mets need to get their clubhouse pulling in the right direction and that is on Lindor.

Here is another baseball truth the Mets learned the hard way last season. The clubhouse pulls together when the pitching staff is successful.

The Mets were 28th in walks allowed last season with 324. That is abysmal. Their pitchers could not get the ball over the plate and that is deflating for a team. Overall, the Mets were 18th in ERA at 4.03, certainly no day at the beach either.

But here is the Big Number, if I’m thinking along the lines of David (RP) Stearns. The RP stands for Run Prevention, which is Stearns’ white whale in a Herman Melville Moby Dick kind of way. This past season the Mets were 18th in runs allowed with 715. That is why he is trying to make the Mets more athletic and a better defensive team. To that end the big experiment is having new Met Jorge Polanco, who was given a two-year $40 million contract, learn how to play first base.

I looked back to the last time the Mets won the World Series, long ago in 1986, and saw the Mets were second in MLB in runs allowed with 578. The Astros, a team the Mets had to squeak by in the NLCS, were No. 1 with 569 runs allowed.

The best weapon for run prevention is 60 feet six inches from home plate.

In that glorious 1986 season the Mets were No. 1 in ERA at 3.11. The Astros were next at 3.15. Run prevention begins on the mound. Just for fun I took a look at 1969, the only other time the Mets won a World Series. The Mets had the third-best ERA in baseball at 2.99 with their World Series opponents the Orioles No. 1 at a stunning 2.83. The Mets were third in runs allowed with 541. The Orioles were tops at 517. But not that World Series. The Mets scored 15 runs and allowed only nine.

Yes, to understand the true value of Run Prevention just go back 40 years to the last time the Mets were World Champions.