Freddy Peralta and a handful of shortstops that will be the focus of the Mets’ upcoming trade. Peralta appears to be a near lock to be moved before the August 3 trade deadline, while the team should be interested in the likes of AJ Minter, Luke Weaver again Brooks Raley.
Besides Peralta, Clay Holmes you are a very compelling recruiting team candidate. Holmes has a $12MM player option that he is sure to decline. He will be getting quite a stir as he is targeted by opponents if he is healthy right now. Holmes broke his right leg when he was hit by a returner against the Yankees on May 15. That halted a good start to the season for the righty, who has a 2.39 earned run average in 52 2/3 innings.
Holmes avoided surgery and has resumed throwing in the bullpen, according to the MLB.com injury tracker. He won’t be able to play in an MLB game before the deadline but could make a minor league rehab start or two. Will Sammon and Tim Britton of The Athletic have unsurprisingly written that other clubs are monitoring Holmes’ progress as they explore a possible trade.
Barring free agency looming, the Mets may choose to hold on to Holmes through the 2027 season. The 33-year-old player tells The Athletic that he is open to negotiations to extend the season that would remove him from the trade list.
“I came here for a reason,” said Holmes. “You almost have a sense of some kind of unfinished business. You want to fix things and do things right here because when you win (in New York), it’s very exciting. I’ve seen that. It’s something I hope to be a part of. I don’t know what that looks like. But that desire is still there.”
The Mets could also grab him and issue a qualifying offer if no extension is available. That would come to about $23.1MM, which would be a compelling one-year proposition for a player who played the last two seasons for a $13MM salary. However, the Mets wouldn’t have an answer to that until a few weeks into the season.
As taxpayers, they will only receive a compensatory draft pick after the fourth round in 2027 if Holmes declines a qualifying offer and signs with another team. That’s less important than what they could get in a trade this summer, where they’re likely to get a few middle-of-the-pack prospects closer to being big-league ready than anyone they select with a draft pick. If the Mets don’t make QO, they obviously won’t get compensation if he leaves in free agency.
It would make sense for the front office to at least gauge Holmes’ asking price before putting him on the trade market. They will not run the scorched earth of reconstruction. Nolan McLean again Christian Scott they are the only two pitchers they can comfortably feature in the 2027 rotation.
Peralta appears unlikely to return after springtime extension talks didn’t get far. Sean Manaea again Kodai Senga they are under contract but were released in exchange for points this year. Taylor Megill he will return from Tommy John surgery. Hopes Jonah Tong again Zach Thornton they are unproven at the major league level.
Even if Holmes isn’t as good as this season’s ERA might suggest, he could be a solid fit for the ’27 pitching staff. Holmes had a 3.53 ERA over 165 2/3 innings last year, his first as a full-time starter. The injury was unfortunate and unrelated to the health of his arm. Holmes attacks the strike zone and gets a ton of ground balls to compensate for his worse than average swing and miss rates. It’s the kind of reliable rotation product the Mets don’t have this season.
Last summer they brought an example of teams approaching this type of situation in a different way. The Royals were receiving phone calls Seth Lugo before a possible exit last July. They used a two-year, $46MM extension a week before the deadline. The guards went in the opposite direction Shane Bieberwho was finishing up his surgery from Tommy John surgery in late July. They traded Bieber to the Blue Jays before his expected release date (which the pitcher ended up not taking after straining his elbow in the playoffs).
Holmes will play the rest of next season at the age of 34. He will likely play for two or three years, which tends to be consistent with the Mets’ penchant for short-term investments in pitchers. Holmes is a year older than Manaea when the Mets re-signed him for $75MM (equivalent to about $66MM after deferrals). He is two years younger than Lugo when he signed his extension and the same age Yusei Kikuchi when he commanded three years and $63MM from the angels. Michael Wacha signed for three years and $51MM spanning 33-35 years.
Manaea was the only one of those pitchers attached to a qualifying offer, which would be a relative drag on the Holmes market if the Mets land one. He will not be eligible for QO if he trades. A strong finish could put a three-year contract at $18-23MM a year on the table, but the Mets may be reluctant to go that far without first seeing him back on the mound against a major league team. They probably won’t have that luxury before they decide to trade.
