The season isn’t one-fourth complete, meaning it’s relatively early by MLB standards.

But it’s also time for concern for a spate of underachieving teams and players to be calibrated against the potential for a rebound.

Here’s our look at some particularly worrisome slow starts around the game.

1. The New York Mets

David Stearns’ nonsensical off-season overhaul — dumping a spate of franchise icons all in the name of improving the defense by signing or moving a bunch of people to positions they’d never played — left the Mets in a much more vulnerable position than any team should be with a $352 million payroll. But it shouldn’t be going THIS badly, even with Juan Soto and Francisco Lindor playing just seven full games together due to their calf injuries. 

At least the Mets no longer have the worst record in the bigs after winning three of four from the Los Angeles Angels and Colorado Rockies. But when you’ve got to win three of four from the Angels and Rockies just to escape the basement.

2. The Boston Red Sox and Philadelphia Phillies

The 2-for-1, you-both-got-your-managers-fired deal here. As with the Mets, the off-season should have provided more of a hint that the Red Sox (who didn’t re-sign valuable veteran leader Alex Bregman) and Phillies (who re-signed every aging veteran this side of Steve Jeltz) might stumble out of the gates. A 4-0 start under interim manager Don Mattingly served as a reminder the Phillies have an immeasurable edge of the Red Sox in terms of postseason-tested players and, especially, competent upper management. Boston’s geniuses apparently thought it’d be a good idea to toss Triple-A manager Chad Tracy into a locker room filled with angry players. Hard to believe “chief baseball officer” Craig Breslow actually played in the majors.

3. The Los Angeles Angels

We should all be immune to being disappointed by the Angels, who have the longest playoff drought in the majors as well as the longest streak of consecutive sub-.500 finishes despite employing both Shohei Ohtani and Mike Trout from 2018 through 2023. 

But the American League is a mashup of mediocrity and Trout is enjoying a renaissance season, so it wouldn’t take much for the Angels to at least hover around the fringes of contention. So of course they’ve lost 13 of 15 to fall to 13-23, which is the worst record in the bigs and puts the Angels on pace to lose 100 games for the first time ever. So there is that.

4. Willy Adames and Rafael Devers, San Francisco Giants SS/1B

Buster Posey’s weird plan to construct a contender around a bunch of singles hitters was always contingent on Adames, the one Giants position player star who chose to play in hitter-unfriendly Oracle Park, and Devers, a blockbuster trade addition last year, providing the token bit of power. 

But the duo have combined for just five homers and rank 161st and 163rd, respectively, in OPS at .579 and .572 as the Giants have started 14-21. Adames’ poor strikeout-to-walk ratio — he’s struck out 45 times while drawing just six walks — is a big red flag after he increased his walk total each of the previous three seasons.

5. Andrew Abbott, Cincinnati Reds P

Abbott outperformed his peripherals (a 2.87 ERA but a 3.66 FIP) while making the All-Star team for the first time last season. But the market correction has been unforgiving for Abbott, whose 5.97 ERA is seventh-worst in the NL amongst pitchers who have thrown at least 30 innings. He is also striking out just 6.2 batters per nine innings, easily the lowest figure of his career and a concerning trend as the Reds bank on a bounce-back.

Everyone seems to have an opinion on how to “fix” the Celtics.

You’ll probably not be surprised to hear I have a few myself. OK, more than just a few.

Raising a 7-foot bar on a bunch of wishful thinking among Celtics fans and senseless knee-jerk reactions among the unfaithful, here’s where I stand on some of the more popular suggestions:

Fire Brad Stevens.

Let’s get the most ridiculous one out of the way.

Stevens was NBA Executive of the Year this year for a reason. He did the seemingly impossible (or so Golden State tells us) … He got rid of a bunch of overpaid veterans, remained competitive even without Jayson Tatum for the most part, and restructured a roster that should be able to compete for Eastern titles for most of the next decade.

Fire him? I say: Reward him.

Fire Joe Mazzulla.

He did such a great job during the regular season, he set himself up for a hard fall in the playoffs. And even at that, you have to wonder what might have happened had Tatum not contracted a case of Embiid-itis.

Did he mismanage the Philadelphia series? Sure. The Pistons would have fired their coach if he’d done that. Maybe even the Knicks and Cavaliers. But they haven’t won a title, made the Finals twice and been a perennial contender for the better part of a decade.

Based on the improbable regular season alone, Mazz deserves the benefit of the doubt. But don’t let it happen again.

Trade Derrick White.

On the surface, this one makes sense. As the 76ers series demonstrated, the Celtics could use a Robert Williams III type more than a White type. But that’s what Stevens, in a rare blunder, thought when he exchanged Anfernee Simons for Nikola Vucevic.

Look at the Eastern Conference. When Joel Embiid isn’t playing – which is most of the time – the top players are almost all guards: Cade Cunningham, Jalen Brunson, Donovan Mitchell, James Harden, Tyrese Haliburton … You need somebody to slow them down.

Yeah, the Celtics could move Jaylen Brown fulltime to the backcourt, but that likely would force Tatum to actually have to guard somebody. Giving Brown the tough frontcourt assignments allows Tatum to freelance, grab cheap rebounds and stay fresh for his late barrage of missed 3-pointers. Wait, that was supposed to be a positive.

Trading White maybe gets you Wendell Carter Jr., but does that make you better? I say: Just bigger.

Trade Jaylen Brown.

Let’s be honest: Breaking up the Brown/Tatum tandem would take a lot of guts. But after watching the Celtics play without Tatum for two-thirds of last season, it’s at least worth considering.

So which one gets shopped? That depends what type of team you want.

We’ve seen what the Celtics look like without Tatum – energetic, defensive-minded and all-inclusive on offense. And that’s without whatever high-level player or players you would get by trading Tatum.

You turn Brown into, say, Naz Reid and Terrence Shannon Jr., and you improve defensively on the interior and offensively on the perimeter. But you lose what made the Celtics so fun to watch this season – the team’s best defender and emotional leader.

I’d keep Brown.

Trade Jayson Tatum.

It might take just one call to turn the Celtics into the Eastern frontrunner again …

Stevens: If we give you Tatum for Giannis, how many first-round picks would you want?

Bucks GM Jon Horst: Let me get back to you on that.

If the response is anything you can count on one hand, the Celtics’ off-season is complete.

Tatum has done a lot of good things for this team, but he’s not in Giannis’ league. Few players are.

The Celtics would get their interior force, a runner who would allow the team to pick up the pace and another elite shot-blocker who would make Boston the most well-rounded defensive force in the league, with White shadowing star little guys, Brown locked onto mid-sized scorers and Giannis pitching a tent in the middle.

Stop dreaming? OK, then I’d settle for Domantas Sabonis and De’Andre Hunter.

Stand pat.

Stevens earned a nice, long vacation. Maybe he should take one.

No phones. See you in October with the same pieces that made the Celtics the favorite in the Eastern playoffs. Even with Tatum at less than 100 percent.

After all, it ain’t broke.

Unless, of course: Brad, this is Horstie getting back to you …

Manchester City will try to keep pace with Premier League front-runner Arsenal on Monday night when they pay a visit to an Everton side still on the fringes of the European picture.

City (21-5-7, 70 points) will begin the day six points back of Arsenal with two matches in hand after the Gunners dispatched Fulham 3-0 on Saturday. The Cityzens won’t be even on games played until May 13, when they make up a postponed match against Crystal Palace that was delayed because of City’s triumphant League Cup run.

As a result, there continues to be the appearance of a chase, although the teams would finish level on points if they win out.

Manager Pep Guardiola insists it shouldn’t matter.

“It’s normal, so it’s the calendar,” Guardiola said on Friday. “Sometimes you play first. Sometimes behind. It is what it is. So, nothing changes in these stages, and you know exactly what you have to do.”

City have won six in a row in all competitions, the last three by a single goal: A 2-1 home league win over the Gunners on April 19, a 1-0 league victory at Burnley three days later, and a 2-1 FA Cup semifinal triumph over Southampton on April 25.

Erling Haaland scored once in both league fixtures to bring his EPL-leading total to 24. In the FA Cup semifinal, Jeremy Doku and Nico Gonzalez scored inside the final 10 minutes to complete a late rally.

Everton (13-13-8, 47 points) finished Saturday in 11th place, but only four points out of seventh, which currently would earn a berth in the UEFA Europa Conference League. Should City win the FA Cup, it could be the top eight English league finishers who earn a spot in Europe.

And if Everton could return to continental competition for the first time since 2017-18, it would conclude a much-improved first season at their new Hill Dickson Stadium, after bringing the curtain down on historic Goodison Park last May.

“We still believe there could be something out there for us. And we’ll keep pushing,” manager David Moyes said. “Building Everton back up is a process which I think is going to take quite a bit of time, but I think the first year or so here, we’ve certainly put decent foundations down. And hopefully we can continue to build on it.”

The Toffees are looking to avoid a third consecutive league defeat for the first time this season after a 2-1 home loss to derby rivals Liverpool on April 19 and a 2-1 away defeat at West Ham last weekend.

Beto, one of two Everton players with eight goals, departed the former contest late with a head injury and missed the latter fixture working through the league’s concussion protocol. He should be available Monday night, Moyes said.

–Field Level Media