Finishing second in a five-team division, which at one point included more than the current handful of teams, could have fans coming to an incorrect assumption that the season was somewhat successful. After all, if you finished second in the NL East, you should have at least come close to making it to the postseason by one way or another. The New York Mets have finished as the second-place team in the NL East multiple times in the franchise’s history. It hasn’t always been what we’d deem a successful year.
The 2014 Mets, for instance, were 79-83 and were 17 games behind.