In 1998, the New York Mets were coming off another season as champions of the no-cigar circuit, finishing with 88 wins for the second year in a row. The club had just addressed a glaring weakness by adding a superstar to their team, and now was the time to address the various gaping holes that had been allowed to fester over the years. Some players had broken out in 1998, creating new ideas and solutions to problems, while others had been disappointments from previous years past and had to be shipped out unceremoniously. 1998 called for a very aggressive jaunt into free agency to fix the holes of the club.

Sound familiar yet?

It’s the tenth anniversary of one of the great Mets offseasons of all-time, the one that created, in my opinion, the greatest Mets club of my generation. Other than a blind devotion to St. Rey Ordonez’s slick fielding, the Mets went out and solved virtually every problem the 1998 club had. Carlos Baerga’s corpse at second was supplanted by rising star third baseman Edgardo Alfonzo, who was able to shift to second thanks to the Mets signing of All-Star Robin Ventura.

The corner outfielders had been a disaster for the Mets in 1998. Left field had been manned by Bernard Gilkey, who was given a four-year, $20 million contract during the 1997 offseason. Finally getting sick of him eating both outs and the entire post-game food spread, the Mets gave him away to Arizona in a contract dump for Willie Blair and others that were allowed to walk after the season. After acquiring superstar Mike Piazza and dealing Gilkey, the Mets gave Todd Hundley an outfielder’s glove and had him stand out in left field, although any real analysis of the situation would say that he wasn’t actually “playing” it. The primary right field job belonged to Butch Huskey, who fought hard with Gilkey for the food spread and had either never learned that you can walk on four balls and was so averse to physical activity that he consciously decided against it. He was dealt to Seattle in the offseason for Lesli Brea. Other Mets who saw playing time in the corners in 1998 included future pinch-hitter and terrible hitting coach Lenny Harris, journeyman OBP machine Tony Phillips, and top prospect washout Rich Becker.

This left the Mets with a solid—but not completely intimidating—Brian McRae in center field and two empty spots. The Mets filled one by signing future Hall of Famer Rickey Rickey, who when he was not playing cards Rickey’d the best that a Rickey can Rickey at his age. The other spot was filled in an interesting three-way challenge trade with the Dodgers and Orioles, where former top prospect Roger Cedeno and flamethrowing reliever Armando Benitez joined the club in exchange for the positionless Hundley. They also dealt gasoline can Mel Rojas for Bobby Bonilla, but you don’t have to remember that if you don’t want to. I certainly don’t. What were we talking about again?

Bringing in Benitez to replace Rojas added to the Mets’ already solid bullpen core of John Franco, Dennis Cook, and Turk Wendell. The rotation was buoyed by 1A guy Al Leiter, and filled with solid veterans like Rick Reed, Bobby Jones, and Masato Yoshii. Blair’s salary would quickly be shuttled around until the Mets ended up with prospect Juan LeBron, who cost the Mets nothing and probably would’ve been better at basketball. To take the fifth spot, Orel Hershiser was signed out of near-retirement at the very end of spring training.

Alfonzo’s blossoming power bat, Cedeno’s breakout season on the bases, and Rickey Henderson and Robin Ventura having stellar seasons were big factors in the 1999 Mets being so good. Benitez’s phenomenal year, Pat Mahomes incredibly hit-lucky season, and the emergence of Benny Agbayani as a credible bench threat were also keys to 97 wins. But did everything go right for the Mets? Absolutely not. They also watched John Olerud regress to the mean, McRae become so pitiful at the plate that Darryl Hamilton had to be brought in at midseason, and their entire rotation regress to the point where the Mets were essentially a team of number three and four starters. And that was when they weren’t dealing with various injuries. However, because the Mets went into the season with such a surplus of talent, that they knew not everything had to break perfectly. With the good fortune most of the offense enjoyed, the Mets had the best team OPS+ in the league.

It’s 2009 now, or close enough, anyway. Johan Santana is our Piazza, Luis Castillo is our Gilkey, Dan Murphy is some weird hybrid of Alfonzo and Agbayani. Omar Minaya viciously attacked the holes in the bullpen during the Winter Meetings, which, as the biggest problem the Mets had last year and given the excess money of having a big-market club, was the right thing to do. The point of this piece, however, is to show that the Mets attacked multiple offseason holes in 1998: this is what needs to happen in 2008 too.

Don’t allow complacency. Your team doesn’t have to go out and sign the absolute best players in free agency when you’re close, but if they don’t, they’d better be addressing as many holes as possible; the 1998 Mets didn’t sign Roberto Alomar, Randy Johnson, or Kevin Brown. The Mets have solidified the bullpen, but now they have to work on the rotation and the lineup. Hopefully, with some help from the new league economy knocking prices down, it will be possible to do all the deeds that are necessary. I’m not advocating extreme measures here: there is no need to spend another $50 million in payroll to add Oliver Perez and Derek Lowe and Orlando Hudson and Bobby Abreu or Milton Bradley or Pat Burrell. Economy does have to come into it at some point, but every weak point on this team needs to be addressed.

Maybe Ollie Perez is going to blossom into the Koufax/Christ figure agent Scott Boras thinks he will, but if he does, it should be for a price closer to Kyle Lohse than AJ Burnett. Or maybe you prefer Derek Lowe. Maybe Jon Garland’s youth and durability, combined with his lower asking price, gets the Mets going. Maybe Jon Niese is ready, but wouldn’t it be nice to have Pedro so there’s at least a little security, especially given how low his demands will probably be? Is there any reason to hand Luis Castillo the job for next year without even addressing the position? Maybe a Dan Murphy and Fernando Tatis platoon would be productive in left again, but didn’t they say the same thing about Karim Garcia and Shane Spencer? Couldn’t the bullpen use one more arm? Joe Beimel if you’re Phillie-phobic, Joe Nelson if you just want a good pitcher?

The hypotheticals? They can go on forever. The keys are simply to find players that address holes at a reasonable price and to not stop trying to improve questionable areas. Omar Minaya is off to a good start this offseason, but anointing the Mets NL East favorites right now is foolish. There are plenty of pieces this team could still use to help get over the hump floating around in free agency right now.

After all, the 1998 Mets could’ve signed Rich Aurilia.