I don?t think there is a team in all of MLB that puts their fans through more torture on an annual basis than the New York Mets. At least the fans of perennial cellar dwellers like the Royals and Pirates have a fairly good idea of the kind of baseball their teams will play every summer. For the past five seasons, the Mets have had an opening day payroll in the top five of all MLB (fifth twice in ?06 and ?10, third once in ?07, and second twice in ?08 and ?09). In 2006, the Mets finished the regular season tied for the best record in baseball, only to lose in Game 7 of the NLCS to an 83 win Cardinals team. In 2007, the Mets pulled off quite possibly the worst regular season choke job in the history of the game while squandering away a seven game lead to the Phillies with three weeks to play. In 2008, the Amazins capped off another floundering finish by blowing a 3.5 game lead in the division with 17 games to play, not to mention a chance to tie for the wild card on the last day of the season to finally miss the playoffs altogether. In 2009, the Mets followed up their epic back-to-back late season collapses with an injury-riddled campaign that saw them finish 23 games out of first place, leaving Mets ownership with a terrible return on their $149 million plus investment. The 2010 version of the New York Mets has been quite the enigma, yet again leading their fan base to a level of frustration unparalleled by any other franchise. By month, their results have been as follows: ? Five games over .500 after April ? .500 through May ? 10 games over .500 after June ? Two games over .500 through July Currently, the Mets are sitting smack dab on a .500 record. With a little less than two months left in the season, it is hard to imagine a scenario that ends with them making the playoffs. However, there have been significant goings on with the team that Jerry Manuel presides over that will have a profound effect on the future of the organization. The Good By far, the brightest spot in the Mets? season has to be rookie first baseman Ike Davis. He has taken the reins as the full time starter in his age 23 season. That fact alone is encouraging, but when you consider that he has already belted 15 home runs, it goes to show that the power potential that many scouts claimed Davis had in the minors is starting to materialize at the highest level. Factor in a 10% walk rate in 2010 and solid glovework at a position that can make the rest of an infield look better and you have your first baseman of the future. While his numbers may not blow you away (.250 BA, .326 OBP, .437 SLG), they are a good jumping off point for a successful career as an above average first basemen. I think it is safe to say that Mets management were a little nervous after the 2009 season in which their franchise player seemed to have lost all semblance of his power stroke. To put that statement into context, we must look at the best way to measure power, which is by using ISO (a number derived by subtracting a player?s BA from his SLG, which isolates how much of a player?s slugging percentage is determined by his extra base hits). From 2004 through 2008, David Wright had posted an ISO of .224. His lowest ISO was .217 in 2005, while his highest was .232 in 2008, validating Wright as one of the most consistent all-around offensive threats in all of baseball. When his ISO dropped precipitously in 2009 to .140 over the course of a full season, the $39 million in salary committed to him over the course of 2010-2012 all of a sudden didn?t seem like the soundest investment. 2010 has proven to be a comeback of sorts for Wright, as his ISO has climbed back to .208; not quite back within his previous range, but nevertheless a marked improvement over 2009. The Mets front office can rest assured that their prized asset looks to be back to his old self. The Bad When New York signed Jason Bay to a $66 million contract in the offseason, they were pretty comfortable that they had landed the middle of the order bat they needed to complement the aforementioned Wright. Who could blame them for thinking that was the case? Bay, in the previous six seasons, had averaged 30 home runs with an .894 OPS, both of which are bogged down by his horrendous 2007 campaign. While Bay?s 2010 salary of $6.5 million may seem like a bargain, a closer look shows that he received an $8.5 million signing bonus bringing the total first year compensation for the contract to $15 million. Simply put, that amount of money is supposed to provide you with much more production than a .749 OPS, a figure that trails, among others, the likes of Jeff Keppinger. Manuel has shifted Bay all over the lineup in an effort to kickstart his season to no avail, even resorting to plugging him into the two hole, a spot normally reserved for contact hitters, not $15 million per year sluggers. This season is starting to look like a lost one for Bay, as he recently landed on the 15-day disabled list with a concussion. Bay will have his work cut out for him over the next few seasons if he is to live up to his monster contract. Another core player for the Mets, and quite possibly the most dynamic player on their roster, Jose Reyes has been a microcosm for the entire team over the past several seasons. In 2009, like so many of his teammates, Reyes missed 126 games due to leg injuries and his return to the lineup in 2010 has produced mediocre results. Two years ago, Jose Reyes was widely considered one of the best young players in the game, a five tool player at a premium position signed to a team friendly contract. Fast forward two years and Reyes is running the risk of having the Mets NOT pick up his 2011 option and let him hit the free agent market. This was an unimaginable scenario just a short while ago, but the prospect of paying $11 million in 2011 for average production at the shortstop position might not seem like the best course of action for a Mets team that is swimming in bad contracts. Among the 12 shortstops in MLB that have accumulated 400 plate appearances this season, Reyes ranks sixth in OPS, eighth in OBP, and a disappointing ninth in walk rate. Whether the Mets pick up Reyes? 2011 option will be an extremely intriguing storyline to follow for Mets fans this offseason. The Ugly Once thought of as a stalwart in the Mets? starting rotation for years to come, two injury-riddled seasons have transformed John Maine from being considered a young pitcher with good stuff and a number two starter upside to a guy who will be returning from shoulder surgery in 2011 and hoping to make the opening day roster. The numbers were ugly this season before he finally succumbed to the idea that his shoulder needed arthroscopic surgery. In nine starts, he pitched to the tune of a 6.13 ERA, a .296 batting average against (57 points higher than his career average), 5.67 walks per nine innings and a 1.82 WHIP. There are no reasons to believe that Mets fans will be expecting anything of value from Maine come 2011 and he will need to do a lot to erase from memory the disasters that were his 2009 and 2010 seasons. The embodiment of ugly has been the performance of none other than Oliver Perez. He might go down as the shining example of how Scott Boras is able to squeeze exorbitant contracts out of teams for players that don?t deserve them. In negotiating Perez?s three year, $36 million contract that kicked in before the 2009 season, Boras compared Perez to the great Sandy Koufax. Since then, the only similarity between the two is the fact that they were/are both indeed major league pitchers. Since the beginning of 2009, Perez has produced the following mind-blowing statistics: a 6.77 ERA, 7.8 walks per nine innings, and a WHIP of 1.96. This has led to him being sent down to the minors in June and, once he was recalled to the big club, relegated to mop up duty in the bullpen. For now and the foreseeable future, Oliver Perez will have to get used to being the highest paid long reliever in baseball. For all that the Mets have put their fans through over the past half decade, the future isn?t as bleak as it might sound. The 2010 season looks to be a lost one, but there is light at the end of the tunnel. A lot of money comes off the books after this season and next and you can be sure that the Mets will be players in the free agent market. There is definitely more good (the sustained all-around play of Angel Pagan; the quality, yet unspectacular, performance of Johan Santana), bad (overpaid and punchless Luis Castillo; the absence and subsequent untriumphant return of Carlos Beltran) and ugly (gross mismanagement of top prospect Jenrry Mejia?s development; the continued failure of the Jeff Francoeur experiment) that could?ve have been discussed in this space. However, the rollercoaster that is the New York Mets is a lot to handle. It is going to take many more writers other than yours truly to dissect the inner workings of a franchise whose talking points seem to be endless. It?s a good thing the New York media has an endless supply of such writers willing to tackle the task.