You could see it during the World Baseball Classic. Ahead of his age-36 season, as he pitched for the Dominican Republic, Huascar Brazobán was locked in. And since the Mets’ season got underway shortly thereafter, he’s been perhaps the most important pitcher in the team’s bullpen and one of the team’s most valuable players on the entire active roster.
Take a look at the 2026 Mets’ page on Baseball-Reference, and there’s Brazobán right next to Juan Soto in the row of the team’s best players by bWAR.
As much as we generally use stats from FanGraphs here at Amazin’ Avenue, bWAR still take priority when talking about what a pitcher has done. Clay Holmes is atop the Mets’ list with 1.6 bWAR, Soto ranks second with 1.5, and Brazobán ranks third with 1.0. For a bit more context, Freddy Peralta—who’s thrown more than twice as many innings as Brazobán—ranks fifth on the team with 0.7 bWAR.
With a 1.78 ERA in 25.1 innings, Brazobán ranks third on the team among pitchers who’ve thrown at least 10 innings this year. His 2.57 xERA is the best on the team, and while his 3.42 FIP isn’t quite as kind, it still has him seventh, comfortably ahead of the likes of Christian Scott, Peralta, and Tobias Myers. And he’s been incredibly flexible with his role, as he’s worked as an opener multiple times and made relief appearances in the third, fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh, eighth, and tenth innings over the course of his 21 appearances.
It’s hard to get too excited about where the Mets stand as the month of May nears its conclusion, but things would have looked even worse over the past two months if not for Brazobán. For a player who found himself optioned to Triple-A Syracuse multiple times last year, really through no fault of his own, it’s fun to see him putting the Mets in a position where they’d really look foolish if they made him part of the roster churn again right now. If he keeps looking as indispensable as he has over the course of these two months, he’s not going anywhere.
