The Mets\u2019 Opening Day pitching matchup against the Pittsburgh Pirates at Citi Field gives fans a treat to start the 2026 MLB season: Freddy Peralta vs. Paul Skenes.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s a marquee showdown between the Pirates ace, the reigning National League Cy Young award winner, and the two-time All-Star who has a lot to prove as the Mets\u2019 premier offseason acquisition.<\/p>\n
For Peralta in his first real game with the Mets, the Thursday afternoon matchup isn\u2019t one he shies away from.<\/p>\n
\u201cI admit and I know that he\u2019s [Skenes] is great, and there\u2019s a lot of more great pitchers around the league, too,\u201d Peralta said Wednesday. \u201cI see it that we\u2019re facing each other, and I know that he\u2019s giving the best for him and his team and I just see it the same way that I give my best for me and my team\u2026 I just see the way that I\u2019m competing against him.\u201d<\/p>\n
Baseball fans and pundits often clamor about matchups between two stellar pitchers. Some players choose to defer when asked about such matchups, often saying a pitcher is going up against the opposing lineup and not an opposing pitcher.<\/p>\n
But not Peralta.<\/p>\n
\u201cBecause I know it\u2019s gonna be a pretty tough day for the offense, and it makes me better when I know that I have that kind of pitcher on the mound,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
On Wednesday, the Mets new ace \u2014 with family currently residing in Flushing and Corona \u2014 expects plenty of family members along with the Latin community to be present at Citi Field. He called the opportunity to take the mound on Opening Day a \u201cbigger responsibility and commitment.\u201d<\/p>\n
The 2026 regular-season opener is now Peralta\u2019s third time beginning a campaign in New York.<\/p>\n
Last season, Perala struck out eight while allowing two runs in five innings in a 4-2 loss against the Yankees. A year prior, he recorded eight strikeouts, a run and a hit in six innings at Citi Field.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo it\u2019s kind of like feels like familiar, but the end of the day, yeah, I am around a lot of new players, so it feels a little different, but at the same time, it\u2019s very familiar, kind of the same,\u201d he said of getting another start of the season in New York.<\/p>\n
The Mets sent top prospects Brandon Sproat and Jett Williams to the Brewers in January for the 29-year-old right-hander. He pitched a career-high 176.2 innings in 2025 and had personal bests in ERA (2.70), starts (33), wins (17) and strikeouts (204). He finished fifth in NL Cy Young voting.<\/p>\n
STILL NO COMMENT ON CONTRACT<\/p>\n
Since Peralta\u2019s arrival to Queens, the pitcher hasn\u2019t offered much information on contract talks with the Mets. The theme continued on the eve of Opening Day.<\/p>\n
\u201cNo comment on that one,\u201d said Peralta, who is slated to be a free agent next winter.<\/p>\n
President of baseball operations David Stearns didn\u2019t change his tune, either.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m not going to comment on any sort of extension or contract talks,\u201d Stearns said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Mets\u2019 Opening Day pitching matchup against the Pittsburgh Pirates at Citi Field gives fans a treat to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":643313,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2402],"tags":[5,9017,753,101,4,1406,877,10,776,64,4297],"class_list":{"0":"post-643312","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-pittsburgh-pirates","8":"tag-baseball","9":"tag-citi-field","10":"tag-freddy-peralta","11":"tag-mets","12":"tag-mlb","13":"tag-opening-day","14":"tag-paul-skenes","15":"tag-pirates","16":"tag-pittsburgh","17":"tag-pittsburgh-pirates","18":"tag-pittsburghpirates"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/643312","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=643312"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/643312\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/643313"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=643312"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=643312"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=643312"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}