213 Miles From Shea

Blade Tidwell is competing for a roster spot this season. If we were to rank prospects by how close they are to the majors, Tidwell, Dom Hamel and Brandon Sproat would round out the short list of starting pitchers who should make their major league debut at some point in 2025. (The Mets have other exciting pitching prospects, but a lot has to happen for them to make their debuts this season).

Tidwell started 2024 with the Binghamton Rumble Ponies and did quite well. Over seven games, five starts, he pitched 37 1/3 innings with a 2.41 ERA, 1.071 WHIP, 2.7 BB/9 and a 10.6 K/9. The high strikeout rate was more what we saw in 2023 where he posted a 11.9 K/9 between Brooklyn and Binghamton.

Similar to all of the older Mets pitching prosects last season, things got a lot tougher for Tidwell in Syracuse. Over 26 games, 122 1/3 innings, Tidwell had a 5.93 ERA and a 1.565 WHIP. He lost control of his pitches (5.6 BB/9) and his strikeout rate plummeted (8.2 K/9).

Another issue popped up in 2023 that continued into 2024. Back in 2023 opponents were getting 6.1 H/9 against Tidwell. That jumped to 8.4 when he went to Binghamton, but dropped to 7.0 during his 2024 Binghamton campaign. That number rose, this time to 8.5 H/9 with Syracuse. An increase of hits, loss of control and a decrease in walks is a bad combination.

Tidwell has a mid-90’s fastball, low-80’s sweeper, upper-70’s curveball and a changeup. There’s a lot of stuff with Tidwell. In 2024 we saw that when given an opportunity to return to a level where he struggled, he came back a lot stronger. That’s exactly what we are going to look for in Syracuse this year – does he come back stronger? Can he fool hitters? Here’s what we are looking for specifically this spring:

• With the Montas injury, there is a roster battle for the last spot in the rotation. Can Tidwell pitch well enough to dislodge all the competition around him? How long does he stay in major league camp?
• How does he handle major league hitters? Does his H/9 look more like what it did in Syracuse or Binghamton?
• Control. Is he locating his pitches? Are hitters swinging and missing at stuff outside the zone or are they laying off?

Cue the SNY music! Mets baseball is back!

The Mets return to the baseball field, St. Lucie, our television sets and our lives this afternoon, taking on the Houston Astros. Juan Soto, one of the most exciting players in baseball, signed a massive contract with the Mets this off-season and will take the field today as a member of the New York Mets.

Tomorrow the Mets will playing 18 innings across two games, so between today and tomorrow we’ll see a sizeable chunk of the pitchers in major league came along with some minor league arms. Today is all about Clay Holmes who hasn’t started in the majors since 2018. He has been an All-Star twice for the Yankees over the last three seasons posting a 155, 152 and 131 ERA+ over that stretch. The Mets will start the process to convert him into a starter this afternoon.

Three Things To Watch For:

1. Clay Holmes the Starter. Earlier this week Carlos Mendoza stated the goal for Holmes today – about three innings or 45 pitches. He hit 45 pitches once last season and it was an outing where he walked two batters over 1 1/3 innings. He hit 30+ pitches only a few times. We’ll try not to read too much into pitch selection – let’s just get some innings in!
2. Lindor and Soto on top of the lineup. Francisco Lindor is coming off of an MVP level season for the Mets. Lindor had a Baseball Reference WAR of 6.0 in 2023 and followed it up with a 6.9 WAR last season, his second and third best seasons in his career. Juan Soto had a 7.9 Baseball Reference WAR in 2024. The Mets offense will live and die with this pair of superstars at the top of the lineup.
3. Brett Baty. Where does Baty fit in this season? He got the call up at the start of the season in 2024, struggled and then Mark Vientos came up. With third base essentially belonging to Vientos, Baty has to compete for a role somewhere on the team. Baty has taken some reps at second this past week during drills. Is he competing for a bench job? Is he effectively auditioning for another team via trade?

Let’s Go Mets!

By now you have probably heard of Brandon Sproat, the 2023 Mets draftee who has sky rocketed up the prospect charts over the last season or so. Going into 2025 he is the #61 prospect overall by Baseball America, #39 by Baseball Prospectus and #46 by MLB.com. He was one of the Mets representatives in the 2024 Future Games.

A fun trivia fact you’ll hear about Sproat often, especially during spring outings this year is he’s a rare three-time drafted player. The Rangers originally drafted him out of high school in the 7th round back in 2019. The Mets then drafted him out of the University of Florida in the 3rd round in 2022. He then went back to college and the Mets drafted him again in 2023, this time in the second round. The Mets clearly wanted Sproat.

Sproat is known as a flamethrower, with a four-seamed fastball that can touch 100 and lives in the upper-90’s. He mixes in a sinker, change slider, cutter and a curveball to round out a huge arsenal.

Last season was his first season of pro-ball and he pitched in games from Brooklyn all the way up to Syracuse. Across all three levels he pitched in 24 games with 116 1/3 innings with a 3.40 ERA and a 1.109 WHIP. He dominated in Brooklyn with a 1.105 WHIP and 1.07 ERA over 25 1/3 innings. He as striking out players at a healthy clip, 11.7 K/9 but his control was all over the place with a 5.7 BB/9.

Sproat’s dominating performance continued in Binghamton with a 2.45 ERA, 0.866 WHIP over 62 1/3 innings. He kept his strikeout rate high, 11.1 K/9 and got a better handle on his control, dropping his walk rate to 2.2 BB/9. It was in Syracuse where he hit a speed bump. His H/9 jumped from 5.6 in Binghamton all the way to 11.3 while his strikeout rate dropped to 6.6 K/9.

This sets up what we are looking for this spring from Sproat. Hitters in Syracuse were able to figure him out, can he start confuse them again? When he takes the mound this spring, we’ll be watching for:

• Batters making solid contact. Did Sproat figure out what was causing him problems in Syracuse? Is he now fooling hitters? Which leads to…
• His pitch selection. Without reading too much into it since pitchers work on specific things early on in spring training, he has a huge arsenal, how do the Mets help him curate it?
• Is there a position battle? The Mets have an open spot at the end of the rotation, but have a lot players on the 40-man roster competing for it. Does Sproat perform so well this spring that he forces a conversation.

For the Mets to consider Sproat out of camp two things are going to need to happen. First, he need to put on an amazing spring training campaign. Second, there needs to be a consistent spot in the rotation for at least a month. As long as he continues to take steps forward this season, we’ll see him with the major league club before the end of the year.

The Mets in the David Stearns era love loading up on hard throwing pitchers on minor league deals, and that’s why the Mets brought in Yacksel Ríos in January 2024. Ríos leans on his mid-to-upper 90’s fastball, let’s take a deeper dive on how he got here.

Ríos was drafted by the Phillies in 2011 out of high school. He made his major league debut in 2017 at 24-years old. After a few years with the Phillies he was placed on waivers in August 2019. He then bounced around with the Pirates, Rays, Mariners, Red Sox, White Sox, Braves and most recently the Athletics.

Over six years in the majors Ríos has a 6.32 ERA, 5.61 FIP, 1.566 WHIP and a 70 ERA+ over 98 1/3 innings. The last time he saw considerable time in the majors was 2021 where he had a 4.28 ERA, 110 ERA+ over 27 1/3 innings spread over 23 games. Ríos fared mostly well in Syracuse last season with a 3.90 ERA, over 27 games (30.0 innings) and a 1.567 WHIP.

Let’s go back to that 2021 year for a moment. That season he tossed his sinker about a third of the time, averaging 97.3 mph. He then mixed in his four seamer 29.6% of the time, which averaged 96.9 mph. He used his mid 80’s slider 86.5% of the time and mixed in his mid-80’s splitter to round out his arsenal.

Ríos has now been with the Mets for a full calendar year, they know what he has. Here’s what we are looking for this spring:

• His bread and butter is his velocity – does he still have it?
• The last time he tossed his sinker in the majors was in 2021. It was one of his better pitchers by true results (.194 BA) but it was his worst pitch by xBA (.254). Is he getting swings and misses?
• Do the Mets have him try something different?

The Mets needed a lot of bullpen help in 2024 and didn’t call on Ríos. In order to move up the depth chart he’s going to need to have an impressive spring and strong start to the season in Syracuse. With the stuff he’s shown in the past – if he can figure out how to get things to click, the Mets will be calling.

The Mets signed Oliver Ortega to a minor league deal at the start of December after he was outrighted by the Astros (and then chose free agency).

Ortega signed with the Angels in 2014 and made his debut with them in 2021. Before the 2023 season the Twins selected him off waivers and before the 2024 season the Astros did the same. He was kept off the mound for all of 2024 due to two elbow surgeries. In Spring Training he had a procedure to remove loose bodies from his elbow. It wasn’t fully successful and he had to have another surgery in June.

Ortega pitched in 27 games in 2022, his career high in the majors. Over 34 innings he had a 3.71, 4.76 FIP, 1.471 WHIP and a 109 ERA+. He had limited major league usage in 2023 with a 4.30 ERA, 4.76 FIP, 1.227 WHIP and a 104 ERA+ over 14 2/3 innings. Ortega showed a lot of promise with the AAA club, posting a 1.82 ERA, 0.981 WHIP over 34 2/3 innings. He had a 11.4 K/9 in the minors and a 8.6 K/9 in the majors, which was close to his 8.7 K/9 in 2022.

Pitch tracking in 2023 picked up five different pitches for Ortega. He tossed a mid-80’s slider 35.4% of the time, a low-80’s curveball (24.2%), a mid-90’s fastball (22.1%), mid-90’s sinker (17.1%) and mixed in exactly three mid-80’s sweepers. In 2022 he used his mid-90’s fastball 58.4% of the time. He did go from the Angels to the Twins during that time. Was this a different organization approach? Is it due to a small-sample size and game script?

Oliver Ortega is pretty much exactly what you expect as a veteran NRI in camp. He has some zip on the fastball and has shown ability to get some high whiff% (2023 slider and 2022 curveball each had a 45% whiff%). If the Mets can help him figure it out, he will be an interesting pitcher to watch in 2025. Here’s what we are looking for this spring:

• Health. Is is he healthy? Can he throw all five of his pitches without pain?
• Are hitters swinging and missing at his fastball? It only happened 12% of time in 2022, the year he relied on it, but happened 22% of the time in 2023.
• The slider was a new pitch for Ortega in 2023 and he relied on it heavily, it had an xBA of .094, by far the best of his pitches. Do the Mets see it as his best pitch? Do they want him to throw his sweeper more which had his best xBA in 2022?

If you have watched the Mets over the last two seasons, you already know today’s NRI player! Grant Hartwig made his major league debut with the Mets in 2023. He pitched in 28 games totaling 35 1/3 innings with a 4.84 ERA, 4.44 FIP, 1.387 WHIP and an 87 ERA+. The Mets kept him on the 40-man roster going into 2024.

Hartwig got two cups of coffee with the Mets in 2024. In April he allowed two runs over 3 innings. He then got recalled during the Mets terrible month of May and allowed four runs, three earned over 3 2/3 innings. Things got worse for Hartwig a month or so later when he needed surgery for a meniscus tear.

Hartwig returned to the mound at the end of July and pitched 17 innings over 17 games allowing 16 runs from 20 hits and 20 walks while striking out 17 batters. Results got a lot better for Hartwig from September 6th on where he allowed two runs over 5 1/3 innings (both runs in the same outing) over five games. The Mets did not tender him a contract at the end of 2024 and then signed him to a minor league contract at the start of December.

In 2023 Hartwig tossed a singer, sweeper, cutter and changeup in the majors. His sinker (and four seamer that was picked up on pitch tracking in 2024) sits int he mid-90’s. His sweeper, which he tosses about the third of the time, sits in the low-80’s, his cutter sits in the mid-to-low-90’s and sprinkles in a mid-80’s changeup.

Grant Hartwig will pitch for the Mets at some point this season. There will be injuries at some point that allow him to get on the 40-man. Right now he looks like a classic bullpen inning filler, just like how he was used in 2024. His 2023 major league results were better than his AAA results (5.02 ERA). The Mets are still hoping he can put together his 2022 season where had a 1.75 ERA over 56 2/3 innings.

Here’s what we are looking for from Hartwig this spring:

• How does he perform in his early spring training innings? Can he continue his momentum from September?
• How long do the Mets keep him around in camp? If he can make it past the second round of cuts, then the Mets may be seriously considering him as an early season 40-man roster replacement player.

For the second straight season the Mets are inviting Dom Hamel to major league camp. Hamel was part of a trio of exciting Mets pitchers to get invited to Spring Training in 2024 (Mike Vasil and Christian Scott being the other two).

Hamel had a rough 2024. It was so rough that at Metsmerized he isn’t even considered a Top 30 prospect for the 2025 season. Dom made 27 starts for Syracuse in 2024, totaling 124 2/3 innings with a 6.79 ERA and 1.749 WHIP. The previous season in Binghamton he had a 4.06 ERA and 1.266 WHIP in almost the same amount of innings (124). For the first time in his career his K/9 slipped below 11 (9.0 in 2024) while his BB/9 ballooned to 5.6 (4.4 career, 3.6 in 2023) and his H/9 also skyrocketed (10.2 in 2024, 7.8 in 2023, 8.1 career).

Dom Hamel, who will turn 26 on March 2nd enters a critical year. The Mets left him unprotected in the Rule V draft in December and no one selected him. Due to his performance last season, he’s even farther down the depth chart to start for the Mets this season. In addition to everyone on the 40-man roster, and veterans on NRI deals, he’s directly competing with top prospects Blade Tidwell and Brandon Sproat this year.

The Mets are absolutely going to give Hamel a look in camp this year. We’re looking for a step towards his 2023 self:

• Generating swings and misses
• Better control, less walks
• Opponents getting less hits

If Hamel can perform at level somewhere between 2023 and 2024, he’ll make his major league debut at some point this season. At the end of the 2023 season, MLB Pipeline had him listed as the #9 prospect in the Mets system. They wrote about his slider and it’s 2,800-3000 rpm. All really exciting stuff, but things have fallen apart fast. The Mets have seen prospects have down years and come back better. Mark Vientos had a -1.1 WAR and .620 OPS (69 OPS+) over 233 PA’s in 2023. David Peterson had two seasons with and ERA above 5 before last season’s breakout. Can Dom Hamel follow in their footsteps?

Rico Garcia was an early addition to the Mets minor league roster this year, signing with the Mets in early November. Garcia was drafted by the Rockies in 2016 and made his major league debut with the Rockies in 2019, allowing seven runs over six innings spread over two games.

Since making his major league debut, Garcia has bounced around organizations going to the Giants, Orioles, Athletics and most recently the Nationals. He really has not seen a lot of time in the majors. His career high in games and innings came in 2023 where he pitched in 10 games (11 2/3 innings) between the Athletics and the Nationals allowing 12 runs from 19 hits and five walks. He also struck out 10 batters.

The Mets are hoping Garcia can build off of his 2024. The Nationals never called Garcia up last season and he ended up pitching 61 2/3 innings in Rochester with a 3.94 ERA, 1.294 WHIP and a 13 K/9. If you want to put stock in AAA saves, Garcia recorded 20 of them last season!

Since Garcia didn’t pitch in the majors last year, the publicly available pitch tracking data for him comes from 2023. In a small smattering of innings, he tossed his fastball 55.4% of the time (mid-90’s, good for the 71st percentile in 2023) and mixed in a mid-80’s changeup and a low-80’s curveball.

Similar to other pitchers we have looked at so far in the NRI preview series, Garcia is quite far down the depth chart and has a lot of competition to just get onto the 40-man roster, let alone the active roster. I can’t stop thinking about his K/9 in 2024 though. On it’s own it is enough to give Garcia a chance this spring. Here’s what we are watching for:

• How often will Garcia pitch this spring? Will he continue to get a look in mid-march when starters are going deep and bullpen locks start getting their work ramped up?
• Do we see the 2024 Garcia who kept H/9 at 6.9 in the minors? Or do we see the 2023 Garcia who had a 14.7 H/9 in the majors?
• Is he still striking out players at an impressive clip? How is he striking out players?

Quick question – who was the first off-season signing for the Mets in the 2024-2025 off-season? If you said Chris Devenski you either follow the Mets extremely closely or are good at following context clues!

The Mets signed Devenski on a minor league deal way back on October 28th. Devenski is a longtime major league veteran who was drafted by the Chicago White Sox in 2011. The following year he was traded as the player to be named later to the Houston Astros.

Houston is where Devenski made a name for himself. In his first four seasons (2016-2019) he pitched 305 1/3 innings spread over 221 games with a 3.21 ERA, 3.49 FIP, 1.048 WHIP and a 130 ERA+. Baseball Reference credits him with a 2.8 and 1.9 WAR across his first two seasons. In 2017 he won the World Series with the Astros and was an All-Star.

Then in 2020 Devenski had elbow surgery and has not been the same. Starting in 2020 Devenski has been with the Astros, Diamondbacks, Phillies, Angels and most recently the Rays. He has pitched only 94 2/3 innings since the start of 2020 with a 6.46 ERA, 5.30 FIP, 1.415 WHIP and a 67 ERA+. Baseball Reference has him with a -1.7 WAR during this stretch. In 2024 he pitched in 19 games over 26 2/3 innings for the Rays with a 6.75 ERA, 7.33 FIP, 1.575 WHIP and a 60 ERA+.

In 2017 Devenski had an xBA in the 96th percentile and whiff% in the 98th. According to statcast, the fastball velocity hasn’t changed much since 2017. It went from 94 mph to 93 mph, but over the last decade that was enough to go from the 66th percentile in the league to the 33rd. His whiff% dropped from 36.8% to 27.1%. He was using his changeup to generate absurd swings and misses. He still leans on his 83ish mph changeup, throwing it 51.3% of the time in 2023 and 47.5% of the time in 2024.

The Mets are hoping they can help Chris Devenski rediscover what he once had. Similar to other players in camp on minor league deals, the hope is that Jeremey Hefner and the pitching lab sees something or can help Devenski see something that can help him miss bats again.

For 2025, Devenski is fairly far down the Mets depth chart. Baseball teams burn through pitchers though so if he stays in the Mets system after camp, given his experience there is a high chance he’ll be called on at some point to fill a gap in Queens. Here’s what we are looking for this spring in Devenski:

• He has four pitches, but throughout his career has primarily used his changeup and fastball. Once his fully warmed up this spring, does he keep a similar usage split?
• Can he start getting swings and misses again on his changeup? Is he changing anything about where he is locating it? For this latter point, I’m not sure if we’ll know unless he, or someone else around him says something.
• In 2017 he had a 26.1 Hard-Hit%. Last year it was 44%! This spring – who is making solid contact against him? At what clip are players making that hard contact?

Génesis Cabrera is a lefty.

On the Mets 40-man roster right now, their only lefties are Sean Manaea, A.J. Minter, David Peterson and Danny Young. The Mets just don’t have a ton of south paw options.

Cabrera signed in 2013 was the Rays and traded to the Cardinals in a package that include Tommy Pham. He would make his major league debut with the Cardinals and stayed with them until he was traded to the Blue Jays in 2023.

Cabrera pitched in 69 games over 62 2/3 innings in 2024 with a 3.59 ERA, 5.13 FIP, 1.468 WHIP and a 113 ERA+. Since 2021, he’s had an ERA+ above 100 and has pitched between 39 and 71 games per season. What’s been holding Cabrera back is his control. His WHIP has been above 1.300 since 2022. He had a 10.7 BB% last season which puts him in the 17th percentile. Mixed with a 18.5 K% (14th percentile), you get a not-so-great combination.

The raw stuff is there though. Last year his fastball average at 96 mph, which was good for the 80th percentile. He throws five different pitches, leaning mostly on a high-80’s cutter (39.3%) and a 96 mph sinker (22.5%) of the time. In addition to his four seamer he also tosses a curveball and a changeup.

Despite the problems with walks and strikeouts (and a literal average groundball rate in 2024 that ranked in the 56th percentile), Génesis Cabrera has found a way to keep his ERA low. He has a career 3.89 ERA and has kept his ERA below 4.00 in three of his six major league seasons. Here’s what we are looking for from Cabrera in spring training:

• Cabrera’s strength is his velocity. How is his sinker and cutter?
• Can he keep the walks down? Any improvement in walks and control will go a long way for Cabrera.
• The players around him. A.J. Minter was a major free agent signing for the Mets, but is also recovering from hip surgery. Danny Young had an 87 ERA+ in 2024. What role do the Mets see for David Peterson?

Cabrera doesn’t have the easiest journey to a roster spot, but if he stays with the Mets after spring training, we’ll probably see him in Queens at some point – the Mets are just not that deep with left-handed pitching.