The Loop

Yoenis Cespedes shows up to Spring Training looking HEFTY, Mets Twitter drags him accordingly

February 13, 2019

As we noted on Tuesday, February provides one of the most underrated sports content opportunities of the year: Spring Training arrivals. About 99.9-percent of these arrivals are framed in a positive light, just as we did with Alex Bregman's A+ farmer's tan. Leave it to the New York Mets to provide an arrival that falls firmly in the .01-percent section.

For some reason, SNY, the cable network that broadcasts the Mets' games, decided to set themselves up for failure (as the Mets tend to do) by tweeting out video of Yoenis Cespedes' arrival on Wednesday. There are many problems with this, starting with the fact that Cespdedes has played in half of the Mets' games since signing his four-year, $110-million contract in 2016. And that doesn't seem to be changing any time soon, as Cespedes had season-ending heel surgeries last July. Yes, that is plural surgeries, which will hopefully fix the bone spurs in both of his heels, which sounds real promising. The originally-reported recovery period of eight tot 10 months is now looking a little too optimistic, as rumor has it Cespedes will not play a game in 2019.

On top of all that, Cespedes rolled up in Port St. Lucie in much different fashion than he has in years past on Wednesday. Remember when he rode a horse into Spring Training in 2016? Well, this year it appears as though he ate the horse this offseason:

Bad camera angle? Maybe. Terrible outfit selection? Possibly. One too many beers this offseason? Definitely. And if you think we're being too harsh, just ask the Mets fans, the undisputed kings of self-deprecation:

Yo Knows Carbs, am I right?

To be fair, it's not like he can workout with two ailing heels, so it's tough to keep the pounds off when you can't do much moving. Still, SNY really had to do him like this? On one hand, you could say they are stupid for setting themselves up, and on the other, you could say this will be one of their most engaging tweets of the year. Chess, checkers, etc. Meet the Mess.