The Mets and Cubs have been on similar paths for years.

They went into rebuild mode under Sandy Alderson and Theo Epstein (Sandy Alderson 2.0), respectively. They were big-market teams that drove their payrolls artificially low. They went gung-ho with high-end youth in specific areas – the Mets with starting pitching and the Cubs with position players.

The Mets entered 2015 with six straight losing seasons, the Cubs with five. That they met in the NLCS validated their reconstructions.

The Mets swept.

The Cubs have reacted.

They are definitively not going at a similar speed as the Mets any longer.

Their eight-year, $184 million deal Friday with Jason Heyward accentuated how the Cubs have opened their wallet and unleashed their aggressiveness while the Mets methodically have continued to try to put useful players around their elite rotation.

It should be emphasized that winning the offseason has few correlations to winning the regular season. I am reminded of when the Mets absorbed criticism following the 2012 season for doing nothing while the Braves imported Melvin Upton Jr. and Justin Upton to play in the outfield with Heyward. That was pretty much a disaster for the Braves – at least until they traded all three.

We will see if the slow-and-steady formula continues to serve the Mets well.

Though:

1. The one recent time when the Mets have shown mass transactional/financial boldness was last July when they obtained Yoenis Cespedes, Juan Uribe, Kelly Johnson and Tyler Clippard and veered from a fringe contender to the NL East beast.

2. The clock is ticking on their core of terrific starters. They are inexpensive (about $8 million in total for 2015 for five impressive 20-something starters) and healthy (as long as Zack Wheeler returns). Neither will stay true, and seizing the moment is vital.

That is difficult. This free-agent market lacks impact players at shortstop and center field – the Mets’ areas of need.

But in comparison to the Mets, the Cubs front office under Epstein has been more aggressive and creative to maximize the young positional core.

For example, Epstein went into last offseason believing the Cubs still were a year from serial contention. But what is available does not work on any particular team’s clock. His front office was never going to know a star manager better than they did Joe Maddon, whom Epstein had interviewed in Boston and faced 19 times a year when the Red Sox played the Rays. And he never was going to know a top starter better than he did Jon Lester, whom he drafted and developed.

So he fast-tracked things. While the Mets gave faint commitment in sticking with Terry Collins – perhaps because they didn’t want to get into a bidding for someone like Maddon – the Cubs invested five years at $25 million in a manager, then six years at $155 million in Lester.

Now, in Epstein’s previously targeted offseason, Ben Zobrist picked the Cubs over the Mets, significantly because Maddon was there. John Lackey agreed to reunite with Lester. Heyward is the most daring move yet — $23 million a year for a guy who has never scored nor driven in 100 runs.

Epstein used his money to double down on positional depth. The Mets could have done that with their pitching. For example, the Mets could have gone after Price at the top or a solid mid-rotation piece such as Lackey, which would have made it easier to use, say, Matt Harvey in a trade for that shortstop or center fielder.

The signing of Zobrist allowed the Cubs to immediately deal the now-expendable Starlin Castro to the Yankees for the versatile/valuable Adam Warren.

In theory, Heyward could be put in center field. But wherever Heyward is used, outside executives think the Cubs essentially can’t give acceptable playing time to all the young positional talent they have in the majors or getting close. They have been focused heavily on free agency, but “had a lot of lines in the water” for trades, according to an NL executive.

The expectation is they could open right field for Heyward by using Jorge Soler in a trade, perhaps in tandem with Javier Baez. Starters such as Cleveland’s Carlos Carrasco and Danny Salazar, Tampa Bay’s Alex Cobb and Jake Odorizzi and San Diego’s Tyson Ross are available. The Indians and Rays, in particular, are looking for young, positional talent – as are the Orioles, who could consider dealing Kevin Gausman.

The Cubs, meanwhile, are looking for utter dominance. This is not just about the Mets. Within the most top-heavy division in baseball, the Cubs have now stolen Lackey and Heyward from the Cardinals, who also were the runners-up for Price. The Pirates continue to behave like the conservative Mets, down to swapping Neil Walker for Jon Niese.

The Cubs are going for it – the rebuild now in the past, a hunger to win a first title since 1908 as overt as ever.