Baseball's most underwhelming teams of 2017

Overcoming the Nationals to claim the National League East title stood to be a tough task no matter what, but perhaps no team had more universal expectations of a Wild Card berth than the Mets did back in April. Armed with a rotation primed to be among the top units in the game and spending big to retain Yoenis Cespedes’s bat at the heart of their lineup, the Mets were expected to stay at the heights of the NL Wild Card race.

Instead, they suffered through a nightmare of a season that will see them scraping in around 20 games south of .500.

It was a debacle caused by underwhelming play and overwhelming injuries. Jacob deGrom was left on his own to fortify the rotation, as Noah Syndergaard, Zack Wheeler and Steven Matz will all finish the year on the disabled list. Matt Harvey missed much of the year to injury again as well, and when he was not hurt, he was either mired in controversy — such as failing to show up at the ballpark on game day and lying about the reason why — or simply awful on the mound (6.59 ERA).

Outside of the beat-up rotation, Cespedes, Jeurys Familia, Juan Lagares and Lucas Duda all missed substantial amounts of time, and the makeshift Mets never could get their footing underneath them. After an August sell-off of veteran parts and an upcoming managerial search to replace the likely retirement-bound Terry Collins, the Mets suddenly face an uncertain future that may not be fixable in a single winter.

San Francisco Giants

A model of consistency for much of the past decade, the collapse of the Giants was the most unforeseeable outcome of the season. A year after winning 87 games and capturing a second NL Wild Card berth the last three years, they now find themselves pushing to avoid losing 100 games and carrying the worst record in the game.

Many of the dependable, experienced portions of the club hit a wall this year, with Hunter Pence, Denard Span, Matt Moore, Mark Melancon, Matt Cain, Johnny Cueto and Brandon Belt all badly underperformed — and did so in a coordinated fashion. The San Francisco lineup is on pace to finish 14th out 15 NL teams in runs scored, with a pitching staff that did little to offset this outage. Four members of the San Francisco rotation have double-digit losses with ERAs over 4.40.

2017 could very well prove just to be a setback season, as a core possessing Buster Posey, Madison Bumgarner and Brandon Crawford can easily be added to and back in the race next year. But the Giants' front office has its work cut out for it in making up ground in a division that is on pace to inhabit half of the NL postseason positions.

St. Louis Cardinals

After a largely successful winter spent making specific tweaks to the roster after a 2016 season that saw them fall just short of the postseason (as well as 17 games back of the eventual-champion Cubs), the Cardinals looked ready to get back into the race this year.

However, things never came together as planned. It started with the loss of the top pitching prospect in the game, Alex Reyes, to Tommy John surgery during the first week of spring training. Their struggles continued as both their key additions — Dexter Fowler and Brett Cecil — and young talents such as Stephen Piscotty, Aledmys Diaz and Randal Grichuk failed to make the type of impacts they were counted on to provide. To complicate things further, Matt Carpenter could not produce from the middle of the order in the same fashion he could as a leadoff hitter, which led to a crowded top of the lineup with Fowler. To cap things off, the bullpen failed to hold more leads after eight innings than any other unit in the game, which refused to allow them to capitalize on a surprisingly up-for-grabs NL Central.

In the end, the everyday St. Louis lineup looks much more like the team's Triple-A affiliate in Memphis as the season winds down, and the Cardinals face an offseason that will require a much more aggressive play then the steady hand St. Louis is accustomed to.

Texas Rangers

On the surface, the Rangers' season has not been an outright disaster of the likes seen with the Mets or Giants. Still, they undeniably took multiple steps backwards this year after posting the best record in the American League last season at 95-67.

In fairness, there were a few factors that worked against them this season, not the least of which being the unyielding start of the Houston Astros that essentially ended the race for the AL West title before the All-Star break.

A mixture of underwhelming performances from a young core, key veteran injuries and misses in acquisitions department led to the frustratingly inconsistent setback of a season for the Rangers. Injuries to Cole Hamels and Adrian Beltre, along with the complete a total collapse of their bullpen early on the year, crippled them out of the gates. Meanwhile, Rougned Odor failed to have an encore of his breakout of a year ago, while Nomar Mazara and Martin Perez posted similar campaigns. Add in the failures of Mike Napoli and Jonathan Lucroy, players brought in to be final touch-type everyday presences, and the Rangers' failures are no mystery.

Toronto Blue Jays 

The American League East is unforgiving terrain, something the Blue Jays can strongly attest to. A year after being armed with one of the deepest rotations in the game, coupled with a lineup capable of creating seemingly instant offense, the Blue Jays entered the year as one of the most feared overall offerings in the American League. But six months and seemingly 1,000 disabled list designations later, the Jays are moving on from the year heading back to the drawing board, as opposed to reaching the postseason for a third consecutive year for only the second time in franchise history.

The Jays never fully bounced back from losing 12 of their first 15 games this year, which included dropping seven consecutive contests along the way. The most stunning pothole that sidetracked the Jays was the unexpected loss of potency at the plate, which highlighted the inaccurate decision they made to not re-sign Edwin Encarnacion and instead bring back Jose Bautista on a one-year deal. Now, a year after boasting an offense that finished fourth in the AL in runs scored, Toronto is on pace to score the second fewest runs in the league and not have a single batter hit for a .280 average.

It is a year that could be chalked up to bad luck, with six opening day starters spending time on the disabled list, along with three stints out of action for last year’s breakout arm Aaron Sanchez. The Jays are likely to attempt a rebuild on the run this offseason, which will be kick-started by moving on from Bautista and could be furthered by potentially dealing Josh Donaldson for a prospect-rich return that could be ready contribute immediately.