{"id":707773,"date":"2026-05-24T20:39:19","date_gmt":"2026-05-24T20:39:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/707773\/"},"modified":"2026-05-24T20:39:19","modified_gmt":"2026-05-24T20:39:19","slug":"new-york-mets-star-pitcher-nolan-mclean-surging-in-cbs-sports-latest-rookie-rankings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/707773\/","title":{"rendered":"New York Mets Star Pitcher Nolan McLean Surging In CBS Sports Latest Rookie Rankings"},"content":{"rendered":"

There isn’t a lot to be excited about regarding the New York Mets<\/a> at the quarter-mark of the 2026 MLB season.<\/p>\n

The offseason losses of Pete Alonso and Edwin Diaz, along with trading away Brandon Nimmo and Jeff McNeil, were tough pills to swallow.<\/p>\n

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The splashy offseason additions of Bo Bichette and Jorge Polanco haven’t worked out as expected, although Bichette has turned a corner as of late.<\/p>\n

Freddy Peralta has pitched well, but he is a rental unless the two sides can finalize a deal on a long-term contract.<\/p>\n

Now, at least rookie pitcher Nolan McLean has pitched well.<\/p>\n

McLean, 24, made eight starts for the Mets in 2025, going 5-1 with a 2.06 ERA. In 2026, he has pitched well, going 2-3 with a 3.57 ERA in 10 starts, although he is coming off the worst outing of the season<\/a> in a loss to the Washington Nationals.<\/p>\n

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Dayn Perry of CBS Sports<\/a> compiled some rookie rankings, and McLean made the list at No. 7, although this was published before McLean’s outing against Washington.<\/p>\n

Here was Perry’s list as of May 14:<\/p>\n

Kevin McGonigle, Detroit Tigers<\/p>\n

Munetaka Murakami, Chicago White Sox<\/p>\n

JJ Wetherholt, St. Louis Cardinals<\/p>\n

Chase DeLauter, Cleveland Guardians<\/p>\n

Parker Messick, Cleveland Guardians<\/p>\n

Foster Griffin, Washington Nationals<\/p>\n

Nolan McLean, New York Mets<\/p>\n

Samuel Basallo, Baltimore Orioles<\/p>\n

Sal Stewart, Cincinnati Reds<\/p>\n

Connelly Early, Boston Red Sox<\/p>\n

And, here is what Perry wrote about McLean landing on this list.<\/p>\n

“Through his first eight starts of the year, McLean has pitched to a 2.78 ERA in 45 \u2153 innings with 57 strikeouts, 12 walks, and a WHIP of 0.9. He backs it all up with an FIP of 2.39, and he’s striking out more than 30% of opposing batters. The latter is an elite figure for a starting pitcher.”<\/p>\n

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Perry also added that McLean has a “very deep repertoire” and entered the season with a ton of hype.<\/p>\n

McLean also made the roster for Team USA at the World Baseball Classic, so that is no small feat.<\/p>\n

Team USA manager Mark DeRosa even turned to McLean for the WBC final,<\/a> showing how much he depended on the rookie even in a big moment.<\/p>\n

As for the Mets, Clay Holmes is injured for some time, and while Peralta has pitched well, McLean could make a case for the best pitcher in Queens.<\/p>\n

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It’s quite a season early on for McLean, and let’s see if he can bounce back after a rough start against Washington.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"There isn’t a lot to be excited about regarding the New York Mets at the quarter-mark of the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":707774,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2396],"tags":[47,5,88,48,226,22912,49,50,1712,51,36543,53,1087,753,1332,120,101,4,73,1690,61,2548,4203,2517,34644,74,6513,7326,67,71],"class_list":["post-707773","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york-mets","tag-baltimore-orioles","tag-baseball","tag-bo-bichette","tag-boston-red-sox","tag-brandon-nimmo","tag-chase-delauter","tag-chicago-white-sox","tag-cincinnati-reds","tag-clay-holmes","tag-cleveland-guardians","tag-connelly-early","tag-detroit-tigers","tag-edwin-diaz","tag-freddy-peralta","tag-jeff-mcneil","tag-jorge-polanco","tag-mets","tag-mlb","tag-munetaka-murakami","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-mets","tag-newyork","tag-newyorkmets","tag-nolan-mclean","tag-parker-messick","tag-pete-alonso","tag-sal-stewart","tag-samuel-basallo","tag-st-louis-cardinals","tag-washington-nationals"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":"Validation failed: Text character limit of 500 exceeded"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/707773","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=707773"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/707773\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/707774"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=707773"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=707773"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=707773"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}