MJ Melendez
Week: 6 G, 21 AB, .286/.375/.857, 6 H, 0 2B, 0 3B, 4 HR, 3 BB, 6 K, 0/0 SB (Triple-A)
2026 Season: 20 G, 72 AB, .236/.313/.556, 17 H, 3 2B, 1 3B, 6 HR, 8 BB, 19 K, 1/3 SB, .234 BABIP (Triple-A) / 56 G, 120 AB, .192/.315/.350, 23 H, 5 2B, 1 3B, 4 HR, 17 BB, 50 K, 0/1 SB, .284 BABIP (MLB)
Following his optioning back down to Triple-A, MJ Melendez made about as good a case as one can make that it was the wrong move, slugging four home runs in his six games back with the Syracuse Mets. Coming into this
series against the Worcester Red Sox, the outfielder/DH had a .216/.286/.431 batting line in his 14 games with Syracuse; now, Melendez is hitting .236/.313/.556, his batting average up .20 points, his on-base percentage up about .30 points, and his slugging percentage up roughly .120 points.
Melendez was optioned down to Triple-A because Tyrone Taylor was activated from the Injured List after spending a month on it due to a right hip flexor strain. All things considered, Melendez has been the better player of the two, posting a 92 wRC+ in limited at-bats to Taylor’s 61 in a similar amount of limited at-bats. With that in mind, Taylor has defensive utility that Melendez does not have, has more versatile as a bench player, and seemingly has the favor of GM David Stearns, who had Taylor rostered on the Milwaukee Brewers when he was GM there and then traded for him in one of his first moves as Mets President of Baseball Operations.
Optimally, with Carson Benge and A.J. Ewing really having established themselves, Juan Soto being Juan Soto, and Luis Robert Jr. making his way back from injury, the Mets have enough starter outfield depth that neither Melendez nor Taylor or anyone else see too many at-bats in Queens.
Daviel Hurtado
Week: 2 G (1 GS), 8.0 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 1 BB, 8 K (Single-A)
2026 Season: 4 G (3 GS), 9.0 IP, 10 H, 6 R, 5 ER (5.00 ERA), 1 BB, 15 K, .409 BABIP (Single-A) / 8 G (7 GS), 36.1 IP, 15 H, 6 R, 6 ER (1.49 ERA), 5 BB, 35 K, .165 BABIP (High-A)
For a little bit, it looked as if we were going to have dual winners, as Jack Wenninger and Daviel Hurtado both had identical Game Scores of 77, the former throwing seven scoreless innings against the Worcester Red Sox with one hit allowed, three walks, and five strikeouts, and the latter throwing six scoreless innings against the Frederick Keyes, allowing one hit, walking one, and striking out 8. Had that been it, it would have been the first time in almost a calendar year that two pitchers won; last year, Wellington Aracena & Brandon Sproat both won during Week Fourteen, which took place between June 24th and June 29th.
But then on Sunday, Hurtado entered the game in the bottom of the fifth and pitched two additional scoreless innings, allowing a single hit and striking out three more. While the game was technically never completed, suspended in the eighth because of rain, I am counting it regardless and Daviel Hurtado is our Pitcher of the Week; already the reigning, defending, undisputed Pitcher of the Week, Hurtado is the first pitcher this season to win it in back-to-back weeks, and becomes the fourth pitcher in 2026 to win twice, joining Channing Austin, Jose Chirinos, and Jonathan Santucci.
Since joining the Cyclones, the Cuban left-hander has thrown 18.2 innings at home at Maimonides Park and 17.2 innings at three different away stadiums- ShoreTown Ballpark in Lakewood, Frawley Stadium in Wilmington, and Harry Grove Stadium in Frederick. At home, Hurtado has allowed just one run (0.48 ERA), scattering 7 hits, walking 3, and striking out 14. On the road, he has allowed five runs (2.55 ERA), scattering 9 hits, walking 2, and striking out 21. While Brooklyn has certainly helped Hurtado’s surface numbers a bit, it’s not like he’s been disastrous or anything like that outside of the friendly confines of Coney Island.
While it’s great to see Hurtado having success, I’m still not exactly sure how viable he is as an actual prospect. As I discussed last week, his four-seam fastball doesn’t have great shape and should be scrapped in favor of his sinker, with Hurtado seeing most of his positive results from his slider and curveball. At this moment, I would not say that either pitch is above-average at this point; to me, both are as effective as they are currently due to pure movement, rather than effective movement. That is, at the lower level of the minor leagues, a pitch with a ton of movement, like a casually sweeping slider that starts at one side of the plate and breaks to the other or a big 12-6 curveball that starts at the letters and lands below the knees, can be extremely devastating. Against the more advanced hitters in the upper level of the minors, batters can sit on pitches like that. Pitches that have sharper, more sudden, late movement are generally more effective than pitches that just have a lot of movement.
There’s a good chance that the southpaw ends up on the backend of the 2027 Mets Top 25 Prospect list anyway, simply because the system is so paper thin as of this moment, but it is my opinion that the left-hander is going to need to sharpen up his repertoire if he is going to have success in Double-A and potentially beyond.
