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New York Mets’ Justin Verlander looks at the fans applauding him as he leaves the field after being removed from a baseball game in the sixth inning against the Washington Nationals, Sunday, July 30, 2023, in New York. (AP Photo/Mary Altaffer)
QUEENS — Justin Verlander’s tune changed in less than a week, and understandably so.
Last Tuesday night, after he held the Yankees scoreless for six innings having allowed just two hits and striking out two, he implored that he was committed to not waiving his no-trade clause and being a member of the New York Mets despite the team being one of the largest letdowns we’ve ever seen.
“That’s why I signed here,” he said at the time. “I want to win here. It hasn’t gone according to plan just yet, but I didn’t sign a one-year deal. So there’s that.”
But then general manager Billy Eppler, with the greenlight from owner Steve Cohen, traded away veteran reliever David Robertson to the Miami Marlins for two prospects. They then pulled the trigger on the largest deal of the trade deadline period by sending Max Scherzer to the Texas Rangers for their No. 3 prospect, Luisangel Acuna.
Eppler maintained that the Mets weren’t in a “firesale” or “liquidation” mode but rather shifting more focus on building up the farm system: “This is just a repurposing of [Cohen’s] investment in the club and kind of shifting that investment from the team into the organization.”
“When you see that happen, you can’t help but think what’s in store for next year,” Verlander said on Sunday after the Scherzer deal was made official. “We play this game to win and to win a championship… So it changed my opinion a little bit. It was tough to see.”
The future Hall-of-Famer and three-time Cy Young Award winner is 40 years old and has admittedly acknowledged the natural process of a…
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