(Now) Useless Mocks Show Why the Mets Traded for Freddy Peralta

I sit here a man conflicted. On one hand, as a Mets fan and the host of Locked On Mets, I am thrilled that the New York Mets have traded for a pitcher that I have had my eye on ever since David Stearns took over as the President of Baseball Operations.

Peralta is exactly the kind of ace the Mets needed to take pressure of rookie Nolan McLean, and other Mets starters like Kodai Senga and Sean Manaea, allowing everyone to defer to a new alpha.

Parting with two top 100 prospects was a tough pill to swallow in dealing Brandon Sproat and Jett Williams, but that’s not why I am conflicted. Really, I am just a bit frustrated that Stearns beat me to the punch on finishing his offseason.

Ever since the Mets signed Bo Bichette, I have been preparing a set of mock trades that I was going to bring on the Just Baseball Show where we could “finish the Mets roster overhaul”. The assignment was to get a starting outfielder and a starting pitcher.

I wrote up mocks on Lawrence Butler and Luis Severino. I had something mocked on Steven Kwan. Then Stearns traded for Robert, and I took my proverbial yellow legal pad, ripped out the page and started again.

Now that the Mets had Robert and Bichette, it was pretty clear that they didn’t need much more to finish off their position player group. Something Stearns all but confirmed at the introductory press conference for Bichette yesterday.

Stearns also said the Mets were looking to add a starting pitcher but they still weren’t sure if they were going to be able to land one (very coy this guy).

We get to 4:00 p.m. EST and I hop on the Just Baseball Show to talk about the Luis Robert trade and to then present my mock trades for top pitchers to Aram Leighton (our prospect guru).

What eventually followed was 50 minutes of back-and-forth conversation that was likely not too different from some of the conversations Stearns was having with executives all offseason as he tried to come up with a deal.

We mocked a trade for Tarik Skubal that the Tigers would actually take, but ultimately decided the cost of acquisition was a bit too steep for the Mets on a rental.

We turned around and tried to trade a similar package to the Padres for Mason Miller and Nick Pivetta, valuing the four years of control of Miller over the year of control on Skubal, especially if you could work a starting pitcher in the deal with Pivetta.

Still, the final package seemed like a lot for the Mets to trade, significantly altering their future.

Next, I tried to line up some mock trades for lesser arms where maybe the Mets didn’t have to trade from the top of their farm system. These were for pitchers who aren’t even necessarily on the trade block, but the goal was to weigh the alternative cost for an arm like Pablo Lopez or Robbie Ray.

Neither of those deals really felt right for the Mets either, as this team is clearly trying to win a World Series after essentially giving Bichette a one-year, $47 million with player options, and taking a $20 million roll of the dice on Luis Robert.

Which brought us to the culmination of the show, mocking a trade for Freddy Peralta.

That conversation centered around what would be the eventual package. Would I as a Mets fan, and occasional prospect hugger, trade both Jett Williams and Brandon Sproat for Peralta.

From listening back to the show in retrospect, the dialogue we had is even more interesting because we learn a lot about the Mets options through each mock trade.

We see what else could have been on the table, but why other pitchers or packages did not make as much sense as what the Mets ultimately pushed across by trading Sproat and Williams for Peralta and Tobias Myers.

While I highly encourage you to watch the conversation, I still think reading through the mock trades we landed on helps to understand why the deal the Mets made was right for the team both in 2026 and beyond.

Tarik Skubal is the Rental Who is Too Good to Trade

The Mock: Mets trade LHP David Peterson, RHP Jonah Tong, RHP Jack Wenniger, IF Ronny Mauricio for LHP Tarik Skubal

Originally I brought two different mocks to the table for Aram to review. One was centered around Jonah Tong with Jacob Reimer and Will Watson as the other two young pieces going the other way. The second one had Tong, Jack Wenninger and Ronny Mauricio as the core of the package.

In either trade, the Mets would send the Tigers a big league starter for the 2026 season. If Detroit liked the upside play of Kodai Senga on a two-year, $24 million deal, that could be one option.

The other would be David Peterson, who would be a rental like Skubal but one that would only cost the Tigers $8.1 million instead of potentially $32 million.

Through out back-and-forth, Aram spotlighted the Tigers preference to add arms, making the Wenniger package more intriguing then the one with Reimer as the second piece, even though Reimer is a top 100 prospect.

For a Tigers’ roster that is already a position player heavy, Aram even wondered if Mauricio would be a fit, or if they would prefer a lottery ticket prospect who was far away from the big leagues instead.

Ultimately, we stuck with Mauricio, but made the mock include Tong, Wenniger, and Peterson instead of Senga. Having Peterson in the fold would leave the Tigers with more money to play with to maybe go out and sign a veteran starter to fortify their rotation further.

When the dust cleared, we found a trade that would be worth the Tigers selling the two-time Cy Young, but was that a deal that was really worth it to the Mets?

The Mets clearly view Tong as big league ready or close to it, as they rushed him to the big leagues for a Wild Card push late last season. Wenniger is likely to start the year in Triple-A after a strong full season in Double-A last year (2.92 ERA in 135 2/3 IP).

Dealing a top 40 prospect in baseball with full control in Tong, a fringe top 100 arm in Wenniger, and also giving up a mid-rotation arm that is cheap in Peterson is a haul. And one that would significantly hurt their rotation depth.

That’s not even factoring in a fourth piece whether that is Mauricio or a lottery ticket.

Who knows if it really would have taken that much to trade for Skubal, or if he is even going to be traded at all, but comparing this package to what they gave up for Peralta, it is clear why they targeted the right ace by making that deal.

The Failed Promise of a Mets-Padres Trade

The Mock: Mets trade RHP Jonah Tong, SS/OF Jett Williams, 1B/3B Mark Vientos, LHP David Peterson, RHP Jonathan Pintaro for RHP Mason Miller and RHP Nick Pivetta

My thought process with this one was that if the Mets put Jonah Tong on the table, I would rather get an elite arm with control than a rental. That’s why I went for Mason Miller.

There was once a point this offseason where the Mets and Padres were reportedly talking shop and two of the names mentioned were Miller and Nick Pivetta.

This trade would give the Mets the starter they need at the front of their rotation now, while also landing them an elite closer for the next four years. The return for the Padres starts off very similar to the trade that went down for Peralta.

The difference is Tong instead of Brandon Sproat, but that’s the difference in four years of control on Miller to one on Peralta. Compared to the Skubal mock, Jett is a better secondary piece than Wenniger, but it would have preserved more of the arms in the system.

Vientos is tougher to part with than Mauricio in some respects, because he has shown more, but he also is out of options and doesn’t have a position. Peterson goes in either mock, and Pintaro is a big league ready arm who could have filled an immediate swing-man role for San Diego.

Compared to the Skubal trade, I liked this package more because you got control on Miller instead of a straight rental, and you also addressed both your rotation and your bullpen in one move. The problem, as I said on the show, is that “I don’t think the Mets want to trade Tong”.

By trading Brandon Sproat and Jett Williams for Peralta, we learned that was absolutely the case, as Milwaukee reportedly asked for Tong in the beginning and the Mets quickly shut that down.

Still, giving up Sproat and Williams was a lot for Peralta alone, when we are still talking about a rental at the end of the day. This where Tobias Meyers turned into the piece that got the trade done in real life, but neither of us was that creative in our mock.

How Different Was Our Peralta Mock?

The Mock: Mets trade RHP Brandon Sproat, 3B Jacob Reimer for RHP Freddy Peralta

We had a full story go up exactly 10 days ago on five mock trades that would make sense for the Brewers to trade Freddy Peralta, and this was the package I created for that piece.

This package still would have netted the Brewers Sproat, and another top 100 prospect in Reimer. But for the Brewers, a team that puts an emphasis on defense and speed, Reimer isn’t exactly the perfect fit.

Reimer is a third base prospect who carries most of his value in his bat, who may not be able to remain at the hot corner by the time he reaches the highest level.

Jett Williams, on the other hand, is an athletic 5’7″ shortstop who has shown the ability to play second base, and center field. Jett has the floor of a utilityman but the ceiling of being a regular at the shortstop position in the big leagues.

For the Mets, Jett was never going to be their starting shortstop. Or at least not for the next handful of years when Francisco Lindor still has some real estate in his prime. Second base seemed like a natural fit for Jett, until the Mets traded for Marcus Semien.

This season, Jett would have started the year in Triple-A, and would have had to play himself into at-bats in the outfield, where he would be competing with top prospect Carson Benge, now Luis Robert Jr., and maybe even Brett Baty (set to fill a utility role himself).

Even with a somewhat blocked path to the show, I still did not like the idea of trading both Jett and Sproat for a rental.

On the show, I explain that if the Mets put Jett on the table with Sproat, the Mets should look to get Trevor Megill thrown in the deal. Whether that was ever floated we will never know, but the Brewers likely would have wanted to keep their closer, who still has two years left of control.

Instead, enter Tobias Myers.

Myers was the perfect piece to push this deal across the finish line, as he gives the Mets a big league arm that has five years left of control. In 2024, we saw the best of Myers, who pitched to a 3.00 ERA in 138 innings of big league work.

His final effort of the 2024 season came in the playoffs, when he blanked the Mets across five innings of a winner-take-all Wild Card Game 3, allowing just two hits and one walk. Clearly he left an impression.

In 2025, Myers was sidelined early by an oblique injury and never quite returned to form until a late-season move to the bullpen. Across 28 1/3 innings pitched in 16 appearances as a bulk reliever, Myers pitched to a 1.91 ERA.

It certainly seems like the Brewers dug their heels in on getting both Jett Williams and Brandon Sproat for Peralta, and just like I argued against that trade on the show, Stearns held firm on needing a secondary piece to part with Jett. That piece became Myers.

What We Learned Through the Excercise

Even going back to the end of the show last night, Aram and I both came to the conclusion that Freddy Peralta was the obvious fit for the Mets.

Making just $8 million in 2026, and not represented by Scott Boras, Peralta is an immediate extension candidate, which would help justify the package even further.

Even if the Mets don’t extend him though, they get a controllable arm back in Myers that softens the blow of losing Peralta in a year if he walks. What also helps soften that blow is the comp pick you will get back in return after you tag Peralta with the QO.

The combination of the potential draft pick compensation, five years of Myers, and getting the ace you desperately needed for 2026 was worth the cost for the Mets.

Trying to trade for a Skubal, or a Mason Miller/Nick Pivetta package only would have taken a bigger hit out the Mets farm system. Instead, the Mets trade two prospects that hurt, but can be covered up by having one of the deepest farm systems in baseball.

In our last top 100 update, the Mets had eight top 100 prospects. The most in MLB.

Now, they still have six top 100 prospects even after dealing two, and they kept their top two pitching prospects on our top 100 in Nolan McLean (No. 3) and Tong (No. 37), and their top two position player prospects in Carson Benge (No. 15) and AJ Ewing (No. 65).

Ewing’s presence as another speedy potential utility man made Jett more expendable, as Ewing is a better outfielder, but can still play some second base as well. Of course, Tong and McLean made Sproat more expendable than he would be for most teams.

The Mets have been stockpiling their prospects ever since Stearns arrived so that they could one day make a trade exactly like this.

This is a deal that completes a remarkable week of transactions by the Mets, which has put them in position to enter 2026 as the favorites in the NL East, and one of the teams who should have a punchers chance against the Dodgers if they eventually meet in October.