Mets fans still gloomy despite team having star-studded roster: ‘I think that that’s kind of in the DNA’

Chris Scopo isn’t sure what heaven is like but he says he’s pretty sure that Steve Cohen will be there. But when the 35-year-old comic was preparing to do a show at the Saratoga Comedy Club on Dec. 2, the night Jacob deGrom signed a contract with the Texas Rangers, he felt like he was in hell.

Danielle Sepulveres, a 41-year-old freelance entertainment and culture writer who grew up around Yankees fans, happened to be awake the night the Mets made a deal with Carlos Correa for a 12-year, $315 million contract. For a minute, she thought she was still dreaming.

“I was just basically waiting for everyone else on Messenger to wake up four hours later to be like, ‘Guys, god, did you see that?’”

Life as a Mets fan is never uneventful. But this particular offseason has featured highs and lows even more extreme than usual between deGrom bolting and the Mets bringing in a star-studded free agent class, headlined by reigning Cy Young Award winner Justin Verlander and marquee shortstop Correa.

But it’s the Mets, so nothing is ever easy. The club has hit a snag in its negotiations with Correa after finding something concerning with his surgically-repaired right ankle. Three weeks after the Mets struck a late-night deal with Correa and his representatives, the contract still has not been finalized.

[ Limited options motivates Mets to get deal done with Carlos Correa ]

So it begs the question, are Mets fans OK right now? The answer is mostly yes, but a tiger can’t change its stripes and a Mets fan can’t always change the propensity for panic.

“I don’t think the majority of fans know how to live in this reality,” said Rich McLeod, a 32-year-old creative director and a lifelong Mets fan from Connecticut. “I think there are two extremes to it. There are the Mets fans who cannot admit to themselves that it’s different than it used to be. And then it’s like the opposite side, every time they sign another Mets fan is like, ‘Why don’t we sign the next best guy? That has become somewhat Yankee fan-like without as much arrogance of having been doing it for like 30 years.”

Mets fans are a different breed. They tend to revel in the misery of a franchise that has a history of being pretty miserable and they’re self-aware enough to admit it. They commiserate on Twitter because misery loves company. They start each season with high hopes and a loaded roster, only to watch the stars get injured and obscure replacement players take their places. The hopes fade each summer as the Mets end up getting walloped by 20 runs in Washington.

But they always manage to find humor in the situation.

The SNY broadcast group of Gary Cohen, Keith Hernandez and Ron Darling reading random pages of the media guide during a disastrous loss? It’s comedy gold. Obscure players on the roster like Johneshwy Fargas, Sean Green (not to be confused with Shawn Green), Trot Nixon for the final 11 games of his career and 27 games of Nori Aoki in a year in which the Mets had World Series aspirations.

This doesn’t even begin to cover the busts who came to Queens on big contracts and failed to live up to them. Though under the ownership of the Wilpon family, those big contracts were few and far between. The offseason expectations in previous years?

“Todd Frazier,” Scopo said. “He’s a nice guy but he stunk with the Mets. And he came from the Yankees, so he had the stench of the Yankees on him as well.”

The Mets would wait out the market to find past-their-prime players to try and supplement the few homegrown stars like third baseman David Wright and deGrom. So when deGrom spurned the Mets for the Texas Rangers shortly before the Winter Meetings in December, it stung. Fans took it somewhat personally.

“We watched him grow up on the field, Sepulveres said. “He was the shy, long-haired guy who just became the phenom.”

Scopo, who was born and raised in Middle Village, Queens, always knew there was a possibility of deGrom going elsewhere, which is why he named his dog Seaver instead of Jake or deGrom. It was impossible to not think of him in a different uniform after he announced his intention to opt out of the final years of his contract with the Mets, though there was always hope he would stay.

Mets fans are particularly good at holding on to hope.

“My heart sank into my stomach,” Scopo said. “And then I had to go do comedy for 200 people knowing that my favorite player is gone.”

But there was still a sense of optimism because the Mets are no longer run by the Wilpons. The budget has blown up. The game is being changed by a Mets fan who has the money it takes to change it.

“These last couple offseasons, it’s weird because I’m excited, and it feels so awesome and so fun,” Sepulveres said. “And I’m also afraid.”

There is more excitement around the Mets right now than ever before, but these fans have been burned time and time again. Some of those scars may never go away. A new generation of fans might be brought up with winning ways but the current group? They know better than to get too excited.

“I think that that’s kind of in the DNA. I don’t know that that ever fully goes away,” McLeod said. “But because of all the moves they’ve made, if they do get Correa, I think it’s going to be a very unique situation where you have a fan base that’s essentially celebrating a free agent signing twice. I think it’d be like half relief, and then full excitement and then realizing, OK, now it’s real.”

But even without Corrrea, the unthinkable finally seems possible. The Mets will be one of the favorites to win the National League and it finally seems as though they have a team capable of living up to the expectations. Correa or not, Mets fans are doing just fine. At least for now, because the World Series still seems like a very real possibility for 2023.

“I dream about it,” Scopo said. “I automatically cry. I start tearing up at the thought of watching it with my dad because I have to watch it with my dad. I’ve dreamed about it my whole life.”