It's time for the Mets to give young pitching prospects a shot

A lot of people were thrilled when the Mets finally landed David Stearns to be their President of Baseball Operations. I was not one of them. It’s not that I thought it was a bad move. Rather, my opinion was to wait and see what happened once he took control. And he began to win me over right away, when he stated that young players deserved a shot. It was my belief that for far too long, the Mets preferred giving shots to guys who were last good three years ago on another team. And it almost always worked out just as lousy as you’d imagine.

Stearns further got in my good graces by refusing to shop in the high end of the pitcher’s market. More often than not, these long-term deals for pitchers on the wrong side of 30 simply didn’t age well. And he refused to bid against himself last offseason to give Pete Alonso a deal of five or more years, which also sat right with me. Alonso got off to a terrific start in 2025 – and has hit well recently, too. But the thing that gets lost is that the issue with the long-term deal with Alonso is not what happens in 2025 but rather what happens in 2028 and beyond.

When Stearns signed Griffin Canning, Clay Holmes and Frankie Montas in the offseason, my view was that while none of those moves seemed great, that Stearns had earned the benefit of the doubt. And I like how he didn’t panic when starting pitchers came down with injuries in Spring Training.

Furthermore, it was good news to me when he gave shots to Luisangel Acuna and Brett Baty when players ahead of them got injured in Florida. It was also a good thing in my mind when he promoted Ronny Mauricio when an opportunity presented itself. Stearns was keeping true to his words to give young players a shot.

Having said all of these positive things about Stearns, hopefully it allows me a chance to say something less than glowing about how he acts in one particular situation. He does not look to give small shots to top pitching prospects, which seems less than great to me. Here’s how Tim Britton and Will Sammon from The Athletic put it back on July 3:

“He does not like calling up prospects for spot starts, preferring to provide them with a longer runway to adapt to the big-league game.”

Maybe you feel that, for whatever reason, top prospects Nolan McLean, Brandon Sproat and Jonah Tong were not ready for a shot in the majors when the Mets had the need. Instead, the Mets gave shots to players like Justin Hagenman, Blade Tidwell, Jose Urena, Brandon Waddell and a host of forgettable relievers, not the least of which was Zach Pop. Those five named players in this graph combined for 35 ER in 50 IP for a 6.30 ERA and it’s only that low because of Waddell. And if we included more of the relievers, it would be even worse.

Why not give a shot to a top prospect instead of known mediocrities and never-weres like Richard Lovelady, Jonathan Pintaro, Colin Poche and Tyler Zuber? That quartet has given up 11 ER in 9.2 IP for a 10.24 ERA. We add these two groups together and we have nine guys who’ve combined for 46 ER in 59.2 IP for a 6.94 ERA, all to avoid giving top prospects a shot.

It seems to me this is no better than importing over-the-hill guys like Adrian Gonzalez or Cameron Maybin and hoping for a dead-cat bounce.

If Tidwell can handle being called up and then immediately sent back to the minors – why couldn’t one of the three top prospects handle it, too? Could it be that Stearns and the front office were more concerned with how it would look if, say, McLean came up and pitched really good? What would the optics be if McLean flourished and Paul Blackburn plodded along with his 7.71 ERA, his mark before going back on the IL, and they optioned McLean to keep Blackburn?

Sure, sure – each minor league pitcher has something that ideally, they’d work on before getting the call to the majors. And Mauricio was supposed to get 200 PA before returning to the majors. But circumstances created an opportunity and now Mauricio has a 112 OPS+. And it’s my opinion that it was much more likely for someone like McLean to give a 112 ERA+ than the collection of flotsam and jetsam that they’ve used instead.

We never know how a pitcher is going to react to being in the majors for the first time. For a lot of them, it’s overwhelming and they give too much credit to the hitters, rather than just pitching like they always do. It’s certainly possible – perhaps even probable – that McLean and the others would fare no better than the pitchers they used, instead.

But just like my preference would be to see Mauricio in the majors than Luis De Los Santos, it just seems like a greater chance for good results with McLean rather than Pop, Urena or Zuber. The Orioles under Earl Weaver would break youngsters into the majors pitching out of the pen, like Doyle Alexander, Wayne Garland and Tippy Martinez. Eventually those guys became starters. There’s no reason the Mets couldn’t do that, too.

It seems like Stearns wants to wait for a top young pitching prospect to be guaranteed multiple starts before he gets the call. It’s just not my ideal way of operating. Who gives the team the best chance to win? It just seems that a spot start or bullpen appearance for Sproat would be far preferable to giving innings to anyone like Lovelady and Poche. And you can’t use the “he’s not on the 40-man” argument, as neither Lovelady or Poche – and a host of others – were on the big roster, either.

Ultimately, it comes down to belief. Stearns can believe that the best way for young pitching prospects to flourish is to be guaranteed multiple consecutive starts. Maybe he’s right. Still, just like with young hitters, my preference is for promising young hurlers to get a shot and not waste time with inferior pitchers if you don’t have to do so.

The Mets have made pitching moves almost daily here recently, mostly because the players they’ve promoted have been terrible. Here’s some recent transactions:

Pop – DFAd after 3 ER, 1.1 IP performance – his only one
Poche – DFAd after 2 ER, 0.2 IP performance – his only one
Zuber – DFAd after 2 ER, 2 IP performance – his only one
Pintaro – Optioned after 2 ER, 0.2 IP performance – his only one

Yes, you can say that part of this is to ensure a fresh arm is available. But what if a better pitcher, you know, pitched better? What if Sproat gave a 1 ER, 3 IP performance? He wouldn’t have had to be bailed out immediately by another pitcher and the bullpen would be in better shape, not needing moves the next day.

Maybe you can’t treat young pitchers like young hitters. But after watching all of the crappy pitchers the Mets have used this year pitch poorly, it sure would be nice to see someone with more upside given a chance. And who knows, maybe if they’re given that shot, they’ll earn additional chances, essentially creating that longer runway from their performance, earning it rather than being handed it.