The miserable last three and a half months of the 2025 Mets season, which culminated in the team losing two out of three games to the Miami Marlins, causing them to miss the postseason, obviously upset the Flushing faithful.
It clearly enraged Mets Baseball President of Baseball Operations David Stearns, who held a press conference five days after the season ended. Stearns told the media the Mets needed to drastically improve on defense. He used the term “run prevention,” which became the catchphrase of the off-season. He also said he could not see “running it back” with the same team.
Stearns quickly showed he was not kidding around. He traded the longest-tenured Met, outfielder Brandon Nimmo, to the Texas Rangers, for 35-year-old second baseman Marcus Semien. He followed that deal up by dispatching Jeff McNeil to the Oakland Athletics for a low-level minor leaguer.
What upset most Mets fans were not the trades, but how Stearns handled the two marquee players who became free agents at the conclusion of the 2025 season.
He refused to make even a cursory offer to first baseman Pete Alonso, who had broken Darryl Strawberry’s all-time Mets career home run record that summer. Alonso wound up signing a five-year, $155 million contract with the Baltimore Orioles.
Stearns wanted to bring back the best closer in the game, Edwin Diaz, but he botched the negotiations. Rather than make his best offer from the get-go, which would have knocked Diaz’s socks off, Stearns told him he had a little wiggle room to improve his offer. The back-to-back World Series champions, the Los Angeles Dodgers, quickly pounced, and silenced the trumpets at Citi Field. They did not even have to commit themselves by today’s standards for a superstar, as Diaz signed a three-year, $69 million deal.
Here is a look at the 2026 Mets team coming out of spring training, which manager Carlos Mendoza will have to get the most from. He will also have to hope the Amazin’s can stay healthy, which was not the case in 2025.
Starting pitching
The failure of the starting pitching staff was the chief culprit for why 2025 was a season Mets fans would like to forget. Yes, injuries to Tylor Megill, Griffin Canning, Kodai Senga, Frankie Montas and Sean Manaea were factors, but that does not tell the entire story. The simple truth is when many of them were healthy, they either had poor control or appeared to be throwing batting practice as opposing hitters pummeled them.
Senga was the team’s ace early on, going 7-3 with a 1.47 earned run average in his first 13 starts before suffering a hamstring strain in June. He was demoted to the Mets’ Syracuse AAA team in the second half because his control was so awful. Senga is still on the roster, but he has gone from ace to question mark.
Stearns knew the Mets needed a real ace. To achieve that, he acquired Freddy Peralta from the Milwaukee Brewers. To get a quality player like Peralta, you must be willing to pay a steep price. The Mets met the Brewers’ demands for two of their top prospects, pitcher Brandon Sproat and infielder Jett Williams.
Rookie Nolan McLean excites Mets fans in a way they have not been since Jacob deGrom left Flushing. He pitched superbly for the Mets’ Binghamton and Syracuse farm clubs, and that success carried over in his eight starts with the team from Flushing last season. McLean started the World Baseball Classic Championship game last week, giving up two runs in four-plus innings to a formidable Venezuela lineup.
Lefthander David Peterson had such a strong first half of the 2025 season that he was named to the National League All-Star team. It turned out 2025 was a season of extremes for Peterson because he was out of gas by August and so were the Mets. If our Flushing heroes are to have postseason aspirations, Peterson is going to have to pitch deep into games the final two months of the season.
Manaea was Stearns’ best signing in his first year running the Mets. He made 32 starts in 2024 as he struck out 184 batters while posting a 12-6 record with an impressive 3.47 earned run average.
2025, however, was a season from hell for Manaea as he missed half of it with a strained right oblique. Just as he was fully recovered from that, it was discovered he had loose fragments in his left elbow. He tried to pitch despite the discomfort, but he could not go deep into games. Manaea should be able to return to 2024 form if he is healthy.
I was among the doubters when Stearns signed veteran Yankees reliever Clay Holmes to be a starting pitcher. Yankees pitching coach Matt Blake told me the Bronx Bombers had never considered him to be part of their rotation. It turned out Holmes was the Mets’ most reliable starter as he made 31 starts while posting a 12-8 record and a 3.53 ERA. The Mets must hope his 2025 season was not a fluke.
The Mets rushed 22-year-old Jonah Tong from the AA Binghamton team to AAA Syracuse to the big club in late August. Unlike Nolan McLean, The Mets’ brain trust wisely decided Tong could use more seasoning in upstate New York and they sent him to their minor league camp on March 10.
A top Mets prospect, Christian Scott, missed all of 2025 recovering from Tommy John surgery. He was impressive in his 2024 starts, and you can expect him to be a major contributor this year. He will begin the season in Syracuse after having a mediocre spring training in which the rust of missing the entirety of last season showed. That will give Scott a chance to build up his velocity and control away from the Citi Field spotlight.
Bullpen
Replacing Diaz, the best closer in the game, and a fan favorite for years, is not an enviable position for any potential successor. It must be extra dicey for Devin Williams, who was an integral part of one of the greatest moments in Mets history.
It was Williams who gave up the three-run home run to Alonso in the ninth inning of the decisive Game 3 of the 2024 National League Wildcard Series in Milwaukee to let the Amazin’s advance past the Brewers to the National League Championship Series. Mets fans are hoping he does not give up any dramatic home runs at their expense.
Williams was traded to the Yankees a couple of months after that lamentable loss. Whether it was the Alonso home run or suddenly playing in the biggest market for professional sports’ most famous team, Williams struggled in the first half of 2025. The good news is he returned to his All-Star Game form in the second half of the season.
Williams will be joined in the bullpen by another veteran of the Yankees relief corps, Luke Weaver. Weaver closed games when he was in the Bronx, so he is a ninth inning option for manager Carlos Mendoza.
One reason the Mets were so awful for the last three and one half months of the 2025 season is because their starting pitchers frequently were out of the game by the fourth or fifth inning, which quickly wore out the bullpen.
The Mets lacked someone who could pitch in long relief. Stearns remedied that by acquiring Tobias Myers from the Brewers in the Peralta trade. The durable Myers is a hard thrower who can give a team five solid innings with little notice.
Huascar Brazoban quietly had a good 2025 season. He was able to give the Mets two innings of quality relief in most of his appearances.
Brooks Raley, who missed the first half of 2025 recovering from Tommy John surgery, was Mendoza’s most effective left-handed relief pitcher.
Mendoza is hoping to have back another lefty in the bullpen this year as AJ Minter, who missed most of last season with a torn left lat, which required surgery. Minter was signed as a free agent and was an excellent reliever for the Braves for many years.
Catcher
Mets fans have been waiting for Francisco Alvarez to live up to the promise he showed as he progressed through the Mets farm system. He has shown flashes such as belting 25 home runs in his 2023 rookie season. The last two years, however, have been a struggle, as he battled one nagging injury after another. Ironically, none of those ailments were related to his catching duties, where getting physically beaten up is part of the job description.
Stearns and Mendoza were frustrated with Alvarez by midsummer for a variety of reasons. He was lunging at pitches far out of the strike zone and his batting average plummeted. More concerning, however, was how Alvarez’s offensive futility affected his defense, going by the numerous passed balls and wild pitches when he was behind the plate.
Alvarez was demoted to Syracuse for about a month. When he returned, both his defense and offense picked up. One hopes he will not be visiting central New York State in 2026 and will stay healthy.
The Mets were fortunate to have Luis Torrens as Alvarez’s understudy. Torrens calls a good game for his pitchers; provides excellent defense; and is not an automatic out. In fact, Torrens has surprising power.
The third-string catcher spot will go to longtime Mets farmhand Hayden Senger. Former Dodgers backstop Austin Barnes and one-time Yankee Ben Rortvedt had been in the running but were dropped from consideration in the days leading up to the season’s start.
Infield
It is debatable which player’s performance will be scrutinized by fans and the press more: Williams, replacing Diaz as the Mets closer, or Jorge Polanco, taking over first base from Alonso.
Polanco signed with the Mets after enjoying some very productive seasons in the Pacific Northwest with the Seattle Mariners. He is a better contact hitter than Alonso, and has respectable power, but he will not put up the gaudy home run numbers Pete did.
The big question about Polanco is “Can he play first base considering he has never done that in his career?” With Stearns being so fixated on run prevention during this off-season, any defensive shortcoming on Polanco’s part will quickly become sports talk radio grist.
Polanco’s neighbor on the right side of the infield will be another newcomer to Queens, second baseman Semien, who was obtained from the Texas Rangers in exchange for outfielder Nimmo. At age 35, Semien’s offensive stats are not as good as they once were, but he is still a Gold Glover in the field.
When their pursuit for free agent Kyle Tucker fell short — as those of most teams do when competing with the Dodgers — the Mets pivoted less than a day later to another high-end slugger, infielder Bo Bichette. His natural position is shortstop, but with Francisco Lindor ensconced there, Bichette will try his hand at third base. Bichette has slightly more experience playing the “hot corner” than Polanco does playing first, but his defensive skills there are unknown.
The only player returning to the Mets infield in 2026 is the incumbent shortstop, Lindor, who is coming off a pair of outpatient surgeries. As soon as the 2025 season ended, he had a procedure to remove fragments from his right elbow. This past February he had surgery on his left hand to repair a fractured hamate bone.
It was the latter surgery that forced him to miss most of spring training, which meant he could not get practice reps with his new double play partner, Semien. There is also concern that Lindor, who is known for slow starts, will struggle at the plate because he will not be able to grip the bat as well as he would like.
Lindor’s hand issue could present an opportunity for the perennial Mets “next big thing,” Ronny Mauricio, to finally get some consistent playing time in Flushing. Mauricio has gone from a trade untouchable to an afterthought for Mets executives. With Lindor fully recovered, Mauricio will start the season in Syracuse, where he will get consistent playing time.
Mark Vientos — who was considered to have been Alonso’s replacement had the Polar Bear not returned to the Mets in 2025 when he first opted for free agency — struggled the entire 2025 season. Currently, he is the odd man out in the infield.
Outfield
Even though he has set it as his goal, the odds of Soto supplanting the Dodgers’ Shohei Ohtani as the National League Most Valuable Player in 2026 is doubtful, given both Ohtani’s innate talent, and the strong lineup that surrounds him. Nevertheless, Soto justified Mets owner Steve Cohen’s faith in him in the first year of his 15-year, $765 million contract by slugging 38 homers, driving in 105 runs and stealing 38 bases. Not too shabby. Soto will move from right to left field this season.
On paper, it appears Stearns got a great deal by acquiring centerfielder Luis Robert Jr. for excess infielder Luisangel Acuna. The reason Stearns could acquire Robert in the trade bargain aisle is because he is two years removed from his superb 2023 season, when he hit 38 home runs while winning a Gold Glove.
Robert’s offense has diminished over the last couple of seasons, and injuries have played a huge part in the decline. To his credit, Robert’s ailments and alarming number of strikeouts did not affect his top-tier defense. The Mets are hoping Robert can stay off the injured list in 2026.
If Robert does miss playing time, the Mets will not lose anything in centerfield defensively because his understudy, veteran Tyrone Taylor, is one of the best defenders in the game. Taylor’s offense is adequate, at best, but he has enjoyed his share of clutch hits as a Met.
Outfielder prospect Carson Benge has drawn more interest at Mets spring training camp in Port St. Lucie than any other player. He certainly played well enough to be on the Opening Day roster, and on Monday, Mendoza announced that Benge would be the starting right fielder for the game.
Acknowledging the Mets are thin in the outfield, Stearns signed veteran Mike Tauchman, who has always been a tough out, to a minor league deal. Unfortunately, Tauchman suffered a miniscus tear late in the spring and will start the season on the injured list.
Mets Swiss army knife Brett Baty is another possibility for right field. Although his best position is third base, the athletic Baty has handled a variety of positions with aplomb. In fact, Baty seems to hit better when he is moved around the diamond, compared to when he has been handed the third base job.
The forecast
Mendoza knows he is on the hot seat if his team gets off to a slow first two months of the season. Cohen, as well as the fan base, will not accept injuries as an excuse for losses.
It is hard to win in professional sports when a team has so many new players at the same time. That is a key reason Stearns’ counterpart in the Bronx, Brian Cashman, and in Philadelphia, Dave Dombrowski, were very conservative this past winter when it came to tinkering with their respective rosters.
The Phillies have won the NL East for the past two seasons. They had one of the strongest pitching staffs in baseball in 2025 until their ace, former Met Zack Wheeler, was shut down because of a dangerous shoulder blood clot. Wheeler’s shoulder surgery was successful, something to be thankful for, and he is expected to return to the Phillies sometime in May.
The Phillies lost one of their top starters, Ranger Suarez, to the Red Sox in free agency, but they are hopeful highly touted pitching prospect Andrew Painter will pick up the slack. And any team with a lineup with Kyle Schwarber, Bryce Harper and Trea Turner is a dangerous one.
The Braves struggled last year because of poor pitching and countless injuries. 2025 was one of the rare years where they missed the playoffs. The pitching is still a question mark, but they are a contender just based on having terrific offensive players such as Matt Olson, Austin Riley, Drake Baldwin, Ozzie Albies and of course, Ronald Acuna Jr. And yes, they still give the Mets a tough time.
The pesky Miami Marlins always aggravate our Flushing heroes. What is most frustrating to Mets fans is they seem to roll over and play dead for every other team.
The Washington Nationals are in total rebuild mode, and the odds are they will lose at least 100 games again in 2026.
My prediction is the Mets will not catch the team down the NJ Turnpike, but they should win enough to come in second and earn a wildcard playoff berth.