The Mets have made official their plan to let manager Art Howe go at season's end, and while the hill is steep for whoever will take over for Howe, it's not as steep as it's being portrayed. The top three challenges facing a new Mets manager are to have the team generate more offense, continue the slow shift to a more athletic club and incorporate young, power arms on the pitching staff and prospects in the lineup or among the reserves. 

A lack
of punch
The Mets aren't as good as some people thought when they were challenging for the N.L. East lead in early July, but they're also not as bad as they have played in the late stages of the season.

The type of manager they hire isn't nearly as important as getting players that produce, especially offensively.

The Mets are at the bottom of the National League in runs scored.

That's a glaring statistic that a lot of people are overlooking as the debate heats up over who will succeed Howe.

All this talk about the kind of approach a new manager should take with the Mets won't matter if the team doesn't hit.

Beefing up an anemic offense
One key problem for the Mets on offense is they don't have a true leadoff hitter.

Japanese import Kaz Matsui hit dramatically better in the No. 2 spot this season than he did when leading off.

He apparently didn't like hitting at the top of the order and his performance at the plate reflected such.

Jose Reyes doesn't mind leading off, but he has not demonstrated patience at the plate and so he won't be a great top-of-the-lineup guy in terms of on-base percentage.

But the way the Mets are constructed right now, Reyes is likely their best candidate to lead off.

The Mets might pick someone up over the winter who could bat in the No. 1 spot, but I would venture to guess that whatever additions are made to the team, they will be more of the heavy hitting category than of players who could bat leadoff.

The Mets could end up hitting between 190 and 200 home runs this season, buy they have a  screaming need for a one -- if not two -- big RBI guys.

Getting more athletic still a key
Last offseason the Mets made it a goal to add speed and defense.

The signings of Matsui and outfielder Mike Cameron were driven by that objective.

The new Mets manager should continue what Howe started this season and that is to incorporate more running into the offense.

Obviously, Howe's successor will not have control over what the roster will look like come the spring, but he would be well served to utilize whatever personnel he has to employ an aggressive approach on the basepaths.

The Mets hit the halfway point of September second in the National League in stolen bases.

They have swiped more bags this year than they have in recent seasons, but that hasn't helped them improve their run production.

Where does Piazza fit?
If Mike Piazza regains his hitting stroke next spring, it will be interesting to see where he plays given the Mets desire to field as an athletic and defensively sound team as possible.

My view is that Piazza has to catch.

I think he has shown this season that playing at least an adequate first base would require so much work from him that at this stage in his career it's not realistic.

He's a catcher, for better or for worse.

To me, the new manager's best move with Piazza would be to try and get him to catch five games a week and play first in one other game.

Who plays first base next season for the Mets becomes an even larger issue since the team will have two premiere young players on the left side of its infield in shortstop Reyes and third baseman David Wright.

There has to be a first baseman that Reyes and Wright trust throwing to since their mission should be fielding balls and not thinking about throwing them.

Young arms and prospects
A manager can only make the moves that he's equipped to make and other than Tyler Yates, Howe did not have the young arms to incorporate in the pitching staff.

But the new manager coming in has got to find a way to take Yates, who possess a power arm, and in conjunction with the team's pitching coach, Rick Peterson, find a way to make him a contributing member of the staff.

The Mets don't have enough young pitchers nearing the majors so they can't afford to have  Yates be a bust.

And they can't afford to have a top prospect like Lastings Milledge, who had a good season in high A-ball this year, end up not being a contributing member of the team, either as a starter or reserve.

Energy and chemistry
Regardless of the personality of the Mets new manager, he'll have to get the team to display more emotion and fire on the field in their everyday play.

That's what the Mets fans are screaming for and the team showed such an approach in the first half of this season.

The most energetic player on the team is Reyes, who is so valuable in part because he plays the game with a contagious energy and fans recognize that and feed off of it.

A lot of baseball executives don't buy into the need for a team to have chemistry, but I'm a big believer in that.

I respect the fact that over a 162-game season, players spend more time in the clubhouse than they do with their families, so a team better have some good vibes going for it in the locker room.

We all know of cases where teams won titles but the players on those teams didn't much like for each other, so it can happen, but I just think it's a more difficult path to travel.

A manager and the veterans on a team can set an energetic and positive tone, and that's a tone that the Mets in recent years haven't had a great deal of because the leader among their position players has been Piazza, who is not a demonstrative, outward guy.

Sweet Lou to Shea?
The most talked about name to replace Howe is Lou Piniella, who is the Devil Rays skipper, but who was courted by the Mets before they hired Howe.

Getting Piniella to Flushing isn't impossible, but his price tag is pretty hefty and the Mets would be paying Howe a lot of money to not manage.

On top of that the Mets would have to compensate Tampa Bay.

Piniella would play great with the New York fans and media, and I think the Mets players would take to him. 

He's a proven winner and he commands respect.

Piniella would be more fiery and confrontational than Howe.

He's just a different personality type.

But if Piazza struggles through another 50-RBI season, and Cliff Floyd, assuming he is still a Met next season, is in and out of the lineup, and Mike Cameron again hits poorly with runners in scoring position -- three of the key things that have plagued the Mets offense this season, a more fiery manager is not going to mean a darn thing.

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