A story from earlier this month linked the New York Mets with Chicago White Sox starting pitcher Erick Fedde before the Mets opened the second half of the campaign with five wins across seven games to improve to 54-48 on the season.

For a piece published Friday morning, Mets reporter Tim Britton of The Athletic suggested the club should now pursue a bigger name and target White Sox lefty and 2024 All-Star Garrett Crochet.

Britton offered his take after The Athletic and ESPN’s Jesse Rogers revealed that Crochet (6-7, 3.07 ERA and 0.97 WHIP with 157 strikeouts over 21 starts and 111.1 innings of work) “wants a contract extension if he’s traded in order to pitch in the postseason” later this fall. Crochet reportedly would also “prefer to stay on a starter’s schedule,” but an extension theoretically could change his mind.

“Trade for Crochet, extend him and make him a multi-inning reliever with scheduled appearances the rest of the way,” Britton continued about the Mets. “Imagine him coming in behind your right-handed starters in the postseason and serving as a one-man bridge to (closer) Edwin Diaz. Put him back in the rotation in 2025 and beyond.”

“That might be worth the significant package of prospects it would require,” Britton added about the Mets possibly trading for Crochet, who turned just 25 years old in June, “as it would mean the Mets wouldn’t have to dive into the deep end of the starting pitching market this winter for a free agent already in his 30s.”

It is worth noting that MLB insider Andy Martino of SNY reported earlier this week the Mets likely wouldn’t sacrifice “significant prospect capital” to make a major splash before Tuesday night. Thus, Danny Abriano of SNY mentioned on Friday morning that Stearns could call the selling Miami Marlins about the availability of closer Tanner Scott.

Abriano pointed out that Scott is a free agent after the season and “should not net a prospect as good as” somebody such as Crochet in a pre-deadline trade. Scott also would give the Mets the bullpen help they’ve needed since even before they began their resurgence in June.

“… What the Mets have made clear is that they are to be taken seriously,” Abriano said. “And that they deserve for the front office to add pieces ahead of the deadline in order to make an already good team even better.”

That’s all well and good, but Stearns may wait to see what happens over New York’s next three games against Atlanta before he pulls the trigger on the type of trade he clearly didn’t want to make exactly one week ago.