Wasted Tenure In Queens

January 21st, 2026. The New York Mets had made a move. They sent two of their top prospects, Jett Williams and Brandon Sporat to the Milwaukee Brewers to acquire Tobais Myers and most notably, Freddy Peralta. It was a move to get another big arm to add to the pitching rotation, and it was a good arm at that. At least when they got him. The move totally backfired on the Mets, as not even eight months later, the Mets moved Freddy to the Tampa Bay Rays for three minor leaguers.

The full trade was Peralta going to Tampa Bay, and Aidan Smith, Gary Gill Hill and Emilien Pitre going back to the Mets.

There had been such high expectations for Peralta in New York, who is currently on the last year of his deal and will be hitting the free agent market this winter. He's a guy who last year in Milwaukee went 17-5 and finished 5th in the NL Cy Young voting last season. When the Mets acquired him back in January, there was a lot of hope that the skill that he had and the year he had in Milwaukee, could be built upon further in Queens. He was even hoping to continue to be that number one guy for the Mets in their rotation. That didn't happen this year.

In his 22 starts in Queens, Peralta went 5-9 with a 4.99 ERA. In 113.2 innings pitched with the Mets he had 113 strikeouts, but got knocked around, giving up 120 hits. That's surprising considering he gave up just 124 hits in 176 innings in Milwaukee last season. He simply, for whatever reason, couldn't get the job done in New York. 

What made this even more surprising for what he did in New York is that he even said he wanted a longer extension. But the way he's pitched so far during his run in New York wasn't going to get that, underperforming during his time in Queens. This was a complete misstep by the Mets, which shows how badly they have mishandled their team the last year or so. But that's another argument for another moment.

Now this is a huge possible moment for the Tampa Bay Rays during their playoff push. As of this writing, they have a 2.5 game lead over the Yankees for the top spot in the AL East. Tampa already has a solid top three in their rotation in Drew Rasmussen, Shane McClanahan and Nick Martinez. If the Rays can get anything close to the Peralta we saw in Milwaukee last year, then this Rays staff is going to be VERY dangerous to go against come playoff time.

If the Rays want to go on a really deep playoff run, there's still one thing missing. They need another bat. Let's face it, the top of the Rays lineup is good, with Yandy Diaz, Jonathan Aranda and Junior Caminearo. Another bat to protect those guys in the lineup, maybe help them balance out that lineup, and the Rays could be very dangerous to deal with come the end of the season and the playoffs.

Major League Baseball trade deadline is at 6PM today!