The New York Mets (10-5) travel from Northern California to the Midwest for a three-game series with the Minnesota Twins (5-11). Since dropping two of three to the Astros in the first series of the year, the Mets have not lost a series, taking two of three from two different series with the Marlins, sweeping the Blue Jays, and losing just one to the Athletics.
While the Mets’ offense has not exactly fired on all cylinders just yet, the pitching staff has been good enough to propel them to first place in the National League East. The Mets’ pitching staff leads the majors in fWAR (2,7), ERA (2.47), FIP (2.97), and HR/9 (0.51). The bullpen, aside from some shaky outings from closer Edwin Díaz and second lefty Danny Young, has been nothing sort of revelatory. While the starting pitching hasn’t been quite as exquisite, the starters have kept the Mets in the game, allowing the offense to do just enough to get through.
Sunday’s matinee with the A’s saw some of the Mets’ bats wake up for the first time this season. In the top of the ninth, both Mark Vientos and Brett Baty collected extra base hits which, in addition to some extremely sloppy play from Oakland Sacramento undefined environs, led to a Mets’ big inning. But that was hardly the only highlight for the Mets this weekend. Aside from Saturday’s power outage, the Mets scored 15 runs across two games, and perhaps began the thawing out process after an incredibly up and down offensive season. For every Pete Alonso and Francisco Lindor, there have been Tyrone Taylors and Jose Siris, and the Mets could really use a more potent lineup to ensure continued success.
Thankfully for the Mets, they’re coming into a Minnesota team whose 5-11 start is the worst in franchise history. The Twins lost seven of their last ten, and have only won back to back games once this season, and that was against the lowly White Sox. That represents the lone series win for the Twins this year, who have played mostly teams in the AL Central thus far this season. The AL Central is not what you would call a good division, but it is one that is going to be fairly competitive. When two subpar teams play, one still has to win.
Right now, only four players on the Twins’ offensive side have an above average OPS+. One of those players is old friend Harrison Bader who leads the team in home runs with three and RBIs with ten. First baseman Ty France, right fielder Matt Wallner, and utility man Edouard Julien are all off to good starts, but no one is exactly lighting the world on fire just yet.
The top of the Twins’ rotation has been effective thus far, with Pablo Lopez looking quite good in three starts and Joe Ryan not far behind him. The Mets won’t see Lopez this series, as he hit the IL with a hamstring strain late last week, but Ryan starts the first game against Clay Holmes. The Mets will also miss former New York farmhand Simeon Woods Richardson, who picked up a win over the weekend against the Tigers. While the Twins bullpen has been good – sixth best in baseball by ERA – their ERA is more than a run higher than the Mets’.
Monday, April 14: Clay Holmes vs. Joe Ryan, 7:40pm on SNY
Holmes (2024): 14.2 IP, 20 K, 9 BB, 0 HR, 4.30 ERA, 2.31 FIP, 113 ERA-
The transition to starter hasn’t been super smooth for Clay Holmes thus far. After an absolutely dominant spring, Holmes has had moments in each game where he looks very much like a reliever struggling to make the transition work, but then a batter later he strikes out a batter and makes them look foolish.
In his last start, he went into the sixth inning for the first time and struck out ten. But he also gave up four earned runs (though, in his defense, two runs scored when Huascar Brazobán was on the mound) and seemed to run out of gas in his last inning. Hopefully, with an extra day of rest and a more successful start under his belt, Holmes can take another step forward.
Ryan (2024): 17.0 IP, 15 K, 0 BB, 2 HR, 2.65 ERA, 3.46 FIP, 68 ERA-
Ryan is coming off his best start of the short season so far, a seven-inning, two hit performance, scoreless performance. Over the past three seasons, Ryan has established himself as a stalwart presence in the Twins’ rotation, with 2024 being his best season thus far, putting up a 116 ERA+ and a 6.39 strikeout to walk ratio.
The lack of walks over three starts is fairly remarkable, though on the same token, so are his four hit by pitches.
Tuesday, April 15: Tylor Megill vs. Bailey Ober, 7:40pm on SNY
Megill (2024): 14.1 IP, 17 K, 7 BB, 0 HR, 0.63 ERA, 2.08 FIP, 17 ERA-
Tylor Megill, like Holmes, has yet to give up a home run this season, which is just one of the statistics that shows what a great start to a season that Megill is having. While Megill has, at times, shown flashes on brilliance before, his first three starts of 2025 provide evidence that, perhaps, Megill is starting to break out like the Mets have hoped he would at various points in the past few years.
While in his last start he threw too many pitches and ran out of steam earlier than the Mets would’ve liked, he struck out seven in four plus innings and hasn’t allowed an earned run since his first start of the season.
Ober (2024): 12.2 IP, 12 K, 6 BB, 3 HR, 7.11 ERA, 5.59 FIP, 181 ERA-
Bailey Ober had a truly miserable first start of the season, giving up eight runs in two and two-thirds innings. Since then, he’s settled down, with Thursday’s start against the Royals being easily his best of the season, going six innings and only allowing one run on four hits, with one walk and four strikeouts.
Wednesday, April 16: Griffin Canning vs. David Festa, 1:10pm on SNY
Canning (2024): 15.0 IP, 13 K, 8 BB, 2 HR, 4.20 ERA, 4.59 FIP, 111 ERA-
The relative success of Griffin Canning thus far is not necessarily shocking; an ERA in the fours and a FIP to match suggests that he’s not exactly looking like a superstar just yet. But Canning is an interesting case study in the Mets’ pitching lab and the way that the current Mets’ front office is looking at pitching.
His last start was not his best, but because of the weirdness of pitching wins, he got the dub. Canning ran out of steam in the sixth against the A’s and saw the thin air of the Pacific Coast League haunt him with a pair of extra base hits.
Festa (2024): 4.2 IP, 4 K, 1 BB, 0 HR, 0.00 ERA, 2.56 FIP, 0 ERA-
The Seton Hall alum is making his second start of the season after beginning the year in Triple-A St. Paul. In his first start, he went four and two-thirds innings of three hit, one run ball.
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