The New York Mets (33-41) travel down I-95 to face the Philadelphia Phillies (40-34) in their first meeting of the year. Having just come off their first meeting with the Braves last weekend, the National League East rivalries are finally getting some play in 2026.
The Mets, as has seemingly been their wont over the last month or so, are entering this series 3-3 over their last six games, having taken two from the aforementioned Braves and dropping two of the three from the last-place Reds. While
the bulk of the past two Mets losses can be placed squarely on the performance of their two starters in those games, it shouldn’t need saying that for the Mets to claw their way back to anything resembling relevancy, they need to beat the bad teams.
For most of this season, the Mets’ bats have been the culprit for their lack of success, but as of late, the thinness of the starting rotation has taken center stage. With only Nolan McLean and Freddy Peralta having made ten starts for the club, there have been a lot of less than ideal slots in the rotation since Clay Holmes went down. Whether or not Kodai Senga or Tobias Myers make starts this turn through the rotation after their ghastly performances against the Reds remains unknown at this point, but the team has to figure out something it can do in order to give the team a chance to win ballgames.
Thankfully, it seems like Francisco Lindor is not terribly far away from a return to the club. Already playing in simulated games, he should be out on a rehab assignment sometime in the next week, which means that a late June/early July return from Lindor is in the cards, and that will do wonders for both the lineup and the infield defense. With apologies to Zack Short, Vidal Brujan, and Bo Bichette, none of them are the baseball player that Lindor is, and with him squarely in the middle of the Mets’ lineup, it will push some of the role players into positions where they are better suited. Put differently, they’ll play less. Sorry not sorry.
In the series finale with the Reds yesterday, it was good to see the Met bats contribute by spraying the ball all over the field and driving in runs by the handful. He’s never going to be his pre-2024 self, but Marcus Semien is contributing with the bat in ways that didn’t seem possible in April. The yung outfielders continue to get big hits, and Bo Bichette is finally looking more like the player he was in Toronto.
Plus, Juan Soto is Juan Soto.
The building blocks are there for the team to do some offensive damage, and the bullpen has been quite good. Take out David Peterson and his Jekyll and Hyde performances, and the rest of the relief corps has been impressive. Austin Warren, Luke Weaver, Brooks Raley, and Huascar Brazobán have all been downright excellent, and Devin Williams and A.J. Minter aren’t too far behind. Even Cionel Pérez has been fine in his three appearances thus far.
And so it must be repeated: it comes down to the starting pitching. If they can get the Braves’ series results from their pitchers, this team has a shot. If they get the Reds’ series results from their pitchers, this team is dead in the water.
The Phillies are having a markedly different season than the Mets for a ton of reasons. After a similarly terrible start, they fired manger Rob Thomson and replaced him with Don Mattingly, who turned the club around in a series way, going 15 games over .500 since he came on board. They’ve gone three excellent starters in their rotation: Cristopher Sánchez, Jesús Lazardo, and old friend Zack Wheeler, and Kyle Schwarber leads the NL in home runs and slugging. The team isn’t exactly a powerhouse; they’re old and getting older by the day, but there’s enough in the tank for guys like Bryce Harper and Brandon Marsh that they’re still a capable team on both sides of the ball.
They team also comes in fairly hot; they’ve only lost five games in the month of June, and have scored four more runs in five of their last seven games. This is going to be an uphill battle but, as has been said whenever the Mets play a division rival, if the team wants us to believe they’ve got a shot, they must win games in division. There’s no other way.
Note: due to the World Cup, the Mets and Phillies are playing a Thursday, Saturday, Sunday series. Off-days on Fridays should be illegal.
Thursday, June 18: Sean Manaea vs Aaron Nola, 6:40pm ET on SNY
Manaea (2026): 49.0 IP, 51 K, 17 BB, 6 HR, 4.78 ERA, 3.89 FIP, 119 ERA-
When Manaea last pitched on Saturday, he had one of his most complete outings of the year: six innings, six strikeouts, two earned runs, no walks, four hits. For a Mets team that has longed for consistency and length out of their starters, this is about as good as you can expect from Manaea, still not back to his 2024 self and still with loose bodies in his elbow for reasons that have never quite been made clear.
Nola (2026): 70.2 IP, 71 K, 24 BB, 13 HR, 5.86 ERA, 4.50 FIP, 139 ERA-
It seems impossible, but Aaron Nola still has four years and a hundred million dollars owed to him by the Phillies after the 2026 season. His 2025 was a disastrous season, and his 2026 isn’t looking all that much better thus far. He’s got an ERA hovering around six, he has exactly two starts all season where he’s given up fewer than three runs, he’s averaging just five innings a game, and he’s walking more batters than he has in all but one season in his career. This is the type of pitcher the Mets should be seeing, to quote Keith Hernandez, rib-eye steaks as they step into the batter’s box.
Saturday, June 20: Freddy Peralta vs Cristopher Sánchez, 7:15pm ET on FOX
Peralta (2026): 83.0 IP, 81 K, 33 BB, 10 HR, 3.90 ERA, 4.05 FIP, 97 ERA-
Five inning Freddy usually wins out, regardless of the result. Through 15 starts, Peralta has been a perfectly cromulent mid-rotation arm, but nowhere near the top of the rotation ace that some pegged him as when the Mets acquired him. He’s been fine; a 4ish ERA will play, but when watching him pitch, there’s often a sense that he’s getting away with something. But then, there are games like, when on on Friday against the Braves, he tossed five innings, giving up four hits, one walk, and one earned run against two strikeouts. But then the start before, he went six innings, but gave up six earned runs.
Sánchez (2026): 99.0 IP, 116 K, 19 BB, 8 HR, 1.82 ERA, 2.15 FIP, 43 ERA-
Sánchez picked right up where he left off last year, already putting up 5.1 bWAR less than halfway into the season. He’s not walking anyone, he’s striking out a ton, and he’s going deep into games. If there’s one bright spot for the Mets, he’s coming off one of his rare poor outings of the season, where he only went four innings. and gave up four earned runs.
Sunday, June 21: TBD vs Zack Wheeler, 7:30pm ET on NBC
Wheeler (2026): 62.2 IP, 62 K, 15 BB, 7 HR, 2.01 ERA, 3.38 FIP, 48 ERA-
Wheeler appears to be the exception to the rule of ‘thoracic outlet syndrome surgery kills careers.’ An ERA hovering around two, less than a baserunner allowed per inning, and a four to one strike to walk ratio, and Wheeler looks like every bit the pitcher he was ahead of surgery. He has reached the sixth inning in all but one start, and has only given up more than two earned runs twice in ten starts. Is there a greater ‘one that got away’ for Mets fans than Wheeler?
