Mets bullpen shaping up for Opening Day
Some question marks still remain for the Mets, particularly with open spots up for grabs in the bullpen, as they work on finalizing the Opening Day roster.
Edwin Diaz, Trevor May, Aaron Loup, Miguel Castro, Dellin Betances and Jeurys Familia are all expected to break camp in less than a week — with Seth Lugo (underwent surgery for loose bone spur in right elbow) sidelined for the foreseeable future. It appears likely the Mets will take eight relievers up north, and manager Luis Rojas indicated as much Wednesday without revealing too much about the team’s top-secret 26-man roster.
“I’m going to say a couple of spots in the bullpen,” Rojas said. “It’s a complicated question right now, still, even though we’re five games away from finishing the spring training schedule.”
A handful of players are competing for the two open spots in the bullpen: Robert Gsellman, Jacob Barnes, Stephen Tarpley, Mike Montgomery, Drew Smith, Arodys Vizcaino, Sam McWilliams and Jerry Blevins. As of Wednesday evening, there were 40 players on the Mets roster with 14 who will be cut by April 1.
Of the names mentioned above, Barnes appears likeliest for a bullpen spot following his dominant performance on Tuesday. The veteran relieved Marcus Stroman in the sixth inning of the Mets’ 5-3 win over the Marlins with men on first and second and no outs. Barnes efficiently retired the side with two strikeouts and a pop out to escape his inherited-runners jam. The outing impressed Rojas, and it may have been enough to earn him one of the last two remaining vacancies.
The last spot could come down to stronger candidates in Gsellman, Montgomery, Tarpley, and Vizcaino. The latter recently dealt with “lateral elbow soreness,” per Rojas, and he hasn’t appeared in a Grapefruit League game since his lone appearance against the Cardinals on March 14. Vizcaino, the former Braves closer, had impressed the Mets with his fastball velocity
before the arm issue.
Gsellman has a 4.50 ERA (three earned runs, six innings) in four relief appearances for the Mets this spring. He has not lived up to expectations over the past four seasons in the big leagues, and Rojas said Tuesday he’s battling for a spot in the relief corps. But the Mets like that Gsellman can throw multiple innings and can even be a starter (albeit with shoddy rotation results) if they need him to shift into that role.
“G is competing and, of course, he can be a great asset for us in the bullpen if he makes the team,” Rojas said.
Smith was a strong bullpen candidate before the Mets announced last weekend that he’s dealing with shoulder soreness. Blevins struggled in his latest relief appearance Wednesday and elevated his spring ERA to 3.86. McWilliams, who received 15 offers from MLB teams before the Mets signed him to a majorleague contract, has never played in the big leagues. The Noah Syndergaard lookalike has a mid-toupper 90s fastball and more in his mix that could help the Mets in the back end of their bullpen.
LUCCHESI FIFTH STARTER?
The Mets’ back-end bullpen decisions are complicated because that depends on who will win the team’s fifth-starter job. The rotation picture became a bit clearer on Wednesday when
the Mets made a series of roster moves, chief among them sending righty Jordan Yamamoto to the Triple-A roster.
Yamamoto was competing for the fifth spot in the rotation but, following his demotion, Joey Lucchesi emerged as the strongest candidate to fill that vacancy. An hour after the Mets announced his option to Triple-A, Yamamoto tweeted: “Always choose to look at the glass half full, never half empty!”
The team has not made an official announcement on the status of its opening week rotation, but it figures to go in this order: Jacob deGrom, Marcus Stroman, Taijuan Walker, David Peterson and Lucchesi.
HIDING DEGROM
The Mets didn’t want to give the Nationals another opportunity to get an early look at their Opening Day ace, so they’re scheduled to have Jacob deGrom pitch in a backfield ‘B’ game on Friday instead of the main ‘A’ game at Clover Park.
Rojas hinted that would be the case earlier in the week, but he confirmed on Wednesday the somewhat expected decision to hide deGrom from the Nationals. Left-hander Peterson, who will likely slot in as the fourth starter in the rotation, will take the hill in deGrom’s place Friday under the lights. DeGrom also faced the Nationals over the weekend when he held them to three hits over 42⁄3 scoreless innings on Sunday.