The New York Mets (44-62) welcome the Atlanta Braves (62-43) to Citi Field for a three game series that likely won’t have an impact on the National League East standings, but will likely have an impact on which players the Mets deal at the trade deadline.
That is to say, this would be a really good week for Freddy Peralta, Brett Baty, Luis Robert Jr, Tyrone Taylor, Brooks Raley, A.J. Minter, and Huascar Brazobán to look as good as possible in order to maximize their trade returns. There will be lots
of debate about other pieces to move, but any piece that requires some nuanced discussion doesn’t need to have a good week in order to get moved.
At this point in the Mets’ season, that’s all we really can root for, because both the division and Wild Card races seem more or less dead and done. The Mets are 18.5 back in the NL East and 11 back in the Wild Card, with just one team further from the post-season (the Rockies). While they’re not statistically eliminated yet, I want to point out that I am not statistically eliminated from winning this week’s PowerBall drawing either. I wouldn’t count on either.
With Juan Soto hitting the IL, any fairy tale ending to the season looks even more remote, and so we need to re-calibrate what a successful 55 games looks like for the Mets. A big part of that is going to be the success of their young starting pitching. Nolan McLean had another quality start this weekend, and he appears to be sanding down some of the rough edges that plagued some of his starts earlier this season. Zac Thornton has benefitted from good defense behind him, but he’s been managing to keep runs off the board since being called up for the second time. Christian Scott is looking great; all of these are good signs for the future, and will make Mets games more watchable for the rest of the season.
Similarly, watching Carson Benge and A.J. Ewing continue to learn the league and produce quality at-bats and good defense is going to make the next two months bearable. Beyond that, it would be nice to see continued success from Francisco Lindor and Bo Bichette, perhaps even enough to not make the 2026 line on back of their baseball cards not stick out like a sore thumb. A resurrection to something looking like a non-replacement level player for Jorge Polanco would make fans feel a lot better about his role on the club next year. The Mets’ catchers are doing their part, but some more consistent offense from Francisco Alvarez would be welcome.
Beyond that, the rest of the season should all be about experimentation. Play Jared Young and Eric Wagaman and decide if one or both of them have a place on the 2027 club. Give some young bullpen arms a real shot to stick around. If Jonah Tong or Jack Wenninger makes sense in the rotation, give them a shot. I’d even play around with putting Kodai Senga back in the rotation to see if there is anything at all left in that tank.
Speaking of a tank, the Mets’ only real goal, standings wise, should be to stay in the bottom six records in baseball for draft advantages. I know this is a tough pill to swallow, as it will likely mean bad baseball for a good chunk of August and September, but there’s literally no benefit for the 2027 club if the team finishes outside of those bottom six. For the fans, yes, there are reasons to want to win, but for the Mets as an organization, they’ve been so handcuffed by penalties that their last few drafts have seen them blocked from picking up any of the top prospects available. If you’re going to suffer through a season like this, you may as well get something out of it.
The Braves are in a totally different situation than the Mets. They’re co-owners of the third best record in baseball and will almost certainly be buyers in the next week. They’ve won eight of their last ten and, despite the Phillies turnaround, look almost guaranteed for a postseason spot. The Braves are one of the most maddening teams for their ability to seemingly generate prospects out of the Georgia clay and their continued racist hand gestures. Even if the Mets weren’t owned by them for the better part of 35 years, they’d still be a thorn in New York’s collective side.
Monday, July 27: Zac Thornton vs Martin Pérez, 7:10pm EDT on SNY
Thornton (2026): 23.1 IP, 17 K, 6 BB, 1 HR, 1.93 ERA, 2.98 FIP, 47 ERA-
Can Thornton keep this up? There have been plenty of successful soft-tossing lefties over the years, but that’s a hard archetype to push all your chips in on. However, this season’s results no longer matter, so there is no better time to test Zac’s mettle than right now.
Pérez (2026): 85.1 IP, 65 K, 36 BB, 10 HR, 3.38 ERA, 4.45 FIP, 79 ERA-
Length has been an issue for Pérez, who has not seen the sixth inning in a month, and who has only completed the sixth inning twice this season. However, his last start, though short, was successful: one hit over four innings, with three strikeouts and four walks. That was also his first start without an earned run in his last ten. He’s making it work without looking dominating or going very long into games.
Tuesday, July 28: Christian Scott vs Chris Sale, 7:10pm EDT on SNY
Scott (2026): 63.1 IP, 78 K, 29 BB, 7 HR, 3.13 ERA, 3.69 FIP, 77 ERA-
After Tommy John Surgery, it’s all a crap shoot, even if the success rate is so much higher than it used to be. So to see Scott thrive has been wonderful. He’s got a similar length issue to Pérez, though some of that is due to his recovery from TJS. But his stuff looks strong and, like Thornton, this is the perfect time for him to work out the kinks.
Sale (2026): 110.0 IP, 134 K, 26 BB, 8 HR, 2.19 ERA, 2.61 FIP, 52 ERA-
Chris Sale is one of the most dominant pitchers of his era, and he continues to look great in his age-37 season. What else is there to say?
Wednesday, July 29: Sean Manaea vs Grant Holmes, 1:10pm EDT on PIX11
Manaea (2026): 85.2 IP, 84 K, 28 BB, 12 HR, 4.52 ERA, 4.27 FIP, 111 ERA-
The Sean Manaea experiment is somehow going better than we would’ve feared in spring training, but is still not what we all hoped for when he signed his new contract after the 2024 season. He’s been solid and consistent since re-entering the rotation, and that’s about all you can ask for from him at this point. It will be very interesting to see what he does through the end of the year, as his rotation spot for next year is very much up in the air due to a number of factors.
Holmes (2026): 97.1 IP, 83 K, 43 BB, 15 HR, 3.79 ERA, 4.83 FIP, 89 ERA-
Another quality arm the Braves developed, Holmes is having his best big league season by just about every metric. He’s going to be a cornerstone of their rotation for the next few years, and it seems like he’s still adjusting and getting better. Joy.
