The Mets saw another rookie pitcher make his debut this week and like McLean and Tong before him, Sproat had a strong debut. Kodai Senga has been booted from the rotation in favor of the youth movement and the Mets are hoping a short stint in the minor leagues will sort him out. In the meantime, the Mets’ young trio of starters is giving the Mets length, but not always wins—partially due to a lack of run support. The bullpen is not all sunshine and rainbows, but this week had more good than bad.
Ryan Helsley’s unprecedented struggles continue, but the bullpen got a shot in the arm this week with the return of Reed Garrett from the injured list.
| Player | Last week | This week |
|---|---|---|
| Edwin Díaz, RHP |  |
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| Reed Garrett, RHP |  |
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| Justin Hagenman, RHP | — | |
| Ryan Helsley, RHP |  |
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| Kevin Herget, RHP | |
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| Clay Holmes, RHP | |
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| Sean Manaea, LHP | |
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| Nolan McLean, RHP |  |
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| David Peterson, RHP | |
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| Brooks Raley, LHP | |
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| Tyler Rogers, RHP | |
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| Gregory Soto, LHP | |
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| Ryne Stanek, RHP | |
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| Brandon Sproat, RHP | — | |
| Jonah Tong, RHP | |
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We’ll start with Brandon Sproat’s much-anticipated debut on Sunday, which went very well, despite him taking a loss for being on the opposite side of Hunter Greene’s best performance of the season. Sproat held the Reds hitless for 19 batters, but then three hits in a row plated the go-ahead run in the sixth (the only damage off Sproat before that came in the form of walks and a sac fly). He bounced back to strike out the next two batters, ending his day with seven strikeouts over six innings of work. Despite the four walks, a quality start in one’s major league debut is certainly a rousing success.
Reed Garrett returned from the injured list and pitched a scoreless seventh inning in a close game in relief of Sproat. He worked around a hit and struck out one in the appearance. The Mets are certainly very glad to have Garrett back and will need him to be in top form down the stretch.
Tyler Rogers pitched a scoreless eighth inning on Sunday to pave the way for the Mets’ almost-comeback in the ninth. It was a really good week for Rogers, who had a clean sheet in three appearances. Rogers began his week with a scoreless sixth inning in Monday’s game. Jahmai Jones reached on a bunt single to lead off the inning, Rogers retired the next three batters with the assistance of a really nice diving catch by Cedric Mullins in center. Rogers capped off his 27th hold of the season with a strikeout. However, Rogers’ most important outing of the week came in Friday’s narrow victory, in which he worked around a leadoff single to hold a one-run lead in the eighth to set things up for Edwin Díaz.
Edwin Díaz earned his 26th save of the season on Friday in a very eventful (or stressful, depending on how you want to look at it) outing. He loaded the bases with nobody out with the Mets clinging to a one-run lead. He then had to change his cleats and it’s like the new pair of kicks flipped a switch. He struck out the next two batters and then induced a ground ball off the bat of Gavin Lux, on which Luisangel Acuña made a fantastic play and flipped the ball to Díaz, who wasn’t going to let first base go uncovered this time. It was an instant Edwin Díaz classic that I’m sure will be featured on Amazin’ Finishes 2025 on SNY for many future rain delays to come. Díaz converted his other save opportunity this week in a far less agita-inducing fashion. In Monday’s game, he recorded a four-out save without allowing a base runner while striking out two.
Monday’s game was a high-scoring affair and it’s a good thing the Mets had their hitting shoes on because Sean Manaea put forward the worst performance of any of the starting pitchers this week. He avoids a poop emoji because the Mets won the game, but he was knocked around for five runs on eight hits in 3 2/3 innings of work. Things could have been even worse, but he struck out six batters while walking only one. He was lucky that his opponent Charlie Morton had as bad of a day as he did. Manaea has been going through it since returning from the injured list and now owns a rather gruesome 5.60 ERA on the season.
Manaea certainly wasn’t the only Mets pitcher to be victimized by a potent Tigers lineup on Monday. Gregory Soto came in to put out the fire in the fourth inning with Manaea in trouble and the Mets in danger of blowing a lead. He successfully got out of the inning without further damage and the lead still in tact, but he came back out for the fifth and the Tigers would eventually tie the game in that inning. Soto recorded a strikeout sandwiched between two singles that put the tying run at third base with one out. That run would come around to score and be charged to Soto. Soto also allowed an inherited runner to score in Wednesday’s loss, but bounced back to pitch a scoreless inning in the following frame in which he was given a clean inning to work with.
The game-tying run charged to Soto in Monday’s game crossed the plate on a Ryne Stanek wild pitch. It was a week of low lows but one very high high for Stanek. Despite that poorly timed wild pitch, Stanek actually earned the win in Monday’s game because he escaped further damage and the Mets went on to take another lead in the next inning, which they held onto, despite some more shoddy work by the bullpen (more on that in a moment). Stanek had two outings this week that were flanked by a Kevin Herget appearance. Herget was tasked with long relief in a lopsided game on Tuesday and understandably ran out of gas in his third inning of work. With the game in danger of becoming a close contest, Carlos Mendoza called upon Stanek, who recorded the final two outs of the ninth. On Saturday, the roles were reversed. Stanek recorded only one out in the seventh inning and gave up an insurance run to the Reds and Herget came in and pitched the final inning and two thirds of the game. He entered with the bases loaded and walked in another run, charged to Stanek, but pitched a 1-2-3 eighth. Stanek had only one really good performance this week, but it was an important one. In the sixth inning of Friday’s game, Stanek took the mound with one out and two runners on and the Mets clinging to a one-run lead. He held it, striking out the first batter he faced, walking a batter to load the bases, but then recording another strikeout to keep the Mets in front.
That outing came in relief of David Peterson, who was not great, but still did much better than his poop emoji performance from last week. Peterson gave up four runs on seven hits in 5 1/3 innings of work, striking out six batters and walking three. With that performance, he improved to 9-5 on the season.
The bullpen as a whole was brilliant on Friday. Brooks Raley pitched a 1-2-3 seventh inning with two strikeouts. Raley’s other outing this week was in Monday’s game, in which he recorded the final out of the seventh inning and then came back out for the eighth and allowed a leadoff double that came around to score on two productive outs. That run brought the Tigers within two, but Díaz’s four-out save put a stop to the comeback.
Ryan Helsley also appeared in Monday’s game and—shocker—he gave up a run. Luckily the Mets had enough of a cushion that it didn’t cost them the game, but it certainly made things more dicey. The really poor outing for Helsley came in Wednesday’s loss. He came in the game in the seventh with the Mets down a run and quickly put the game out of reach entirely. He allowed a single, a walk, and a three-run homer before recording an out and in the blink of an eye a one-run deficit became a four-run deficit. Justin Hagenman, who was recalled when rosters expanded, came in the game once things were out of hand and pitched the final 1 1/3 innings of the game without allowing a base runner.
Clay Holmes started Wednesday’s game and pitched okay, but couldn’t make it out of the fifth because he issued two walks. Soto allowed one of those to cross the plate, so all told, Holmes gave up three runs—two of them earned—in 4 2/3 innings of work. He struck out six and walked three total batters in the outing. He took the loss, falling to 11-7 on the season.
Thanks in part to buckets of run support, Nolan McLean earned his fourth straight win in his first four big league starts. Though he was slightly more fallible than he was in his previous start, he still pitched a really good game. He allowed two runs on three hits in six innings of work. What was different for McLean this time was the walks; he issued three free passes. But he struck out seven batters and despite a shaky ninth inning for the bullpen, he came away with the victory.
Jonah Tong was not as lucky in the run support department this time around, nor did he pitch as well as he did in his debut. He still lasted six innings, but he had to gut his way through them. He allowed only three hits, but all three of them were home runs (it was Great American Ballpark, to be fair), so that tagged him with four runs. Tong’s other problem was walks; he walked four batters and struck out six. With the Mets unable to complete a comeback, Tong evened his record to 1-1.
