A Canning of Whoopass

Good morning! From what I can tell, most if not all of my beautiful paid subscribers to this newsletter open these missives at sometime between six and nine in the morning eastern time. If that happens to be the case, flip on Fox right now. Boom: a regular season major league baseball game, live from Japan. Enjoy the audio while we provide you the visuals for the next couple of minutes…

The first report that he was going to make the initial Mets’ starting rotation for 2025 had been printed hours earlier, but Griffin Canning didn’t want to take any chances yesterday and have himself a dud. So he went out there on the Clover Park mound against the Tampa Bay Rays and put together a great nine-strikeout performance. His lone mistake was a home run to Josh Lowe, and Statcast said it would have been a home run in an actual MLB ballpark in exactly zero places. In 71 pitches, the ex-Angel, now-pitching demon, went 4.2 innings, allowed three hits, walked one, and the one earned run off the fake homer. Nine of the 14 outs he recorded, as previous mentioned, were of the strike out variety. His spring ERA is a ridiculous 0.90. He found success finding the right mix of sliders (36), four-seamers (18), and changeups (17). Canning managed to make the Rays swing and miss one dozen times, at least once on each type of pitch. 

Per Tim Britton and Anthony DiComo, the plan is for Tylor Megill and Canning to follow Clay Holmes as the starting pitchers for the Mets against the Houston Astros in the first series of the regular season, followed by David Peterson and Kodai Senga pitching in Miami against the Marlins. Long-time readers would not be surprised to learn that I don’t agree with this. I mean no disrespect to Canning or Megill, and giving Senga as much time as possible to prepare is smart, but shifting Petey to the second series doesn’t work for me. Psychologically, it’s the Mets not showing respect to the guy whose been around since 2020 and saved their bacons late last year and pitched well when called upon in unfamiliar situations as a piggybacking starter/reliever/closer. While the Astros have a lineup full of right-handed batters and the dangerous Yordan Alvarez, I’d be more confident in Peterson facing them down than Megill or Canning. And DP has faced the Marlins twice already in spring training, so they’ve already gotten a decent look at him before they’re now due to face him when the games count. It’s almost as if I have no input in what the Mets do! What a feeling!

I’m fine. I want to say it doesn’t matter in the grand scheme of things, but I don’t want to pull on that thread, because where do you stop? I’d like to say it’ll still be in March, but as we saw a year ago, the Mets needed every single win to squeeze into the playoffs. I will say, after yesterday, I feel better about the team’s chances with Cy Canning than I did before. The People That Know Stuff are already insisting online they always knew Canning can be as good as he’s been showing himself to potentially be this spring, and that’s a good sign. And Tylor Megill is an accidental veteran at pitching in opening series games for the Mets. I just hope David Peterson, my best friend apparently?, isn’t annoyed. 

What about Paul Blackburn? Good question. Blackburn will likely start off in the bullpen. He’s been doing decent damage control after his crummy two Grapefruit League appearances this spring by putting up decent lines like he did yesterday in the other split-splad game, a 6-5 win over the Miami Marlins. Blackburn went four innings, throwing 73 pitches, allowing three hits, two earned runs, two walks, a home run, but striking out six batters. His spring ERA is now a less nightmarish 5.68.

Blackburn was followed in that game in Jupiter, FL by Justin Hagenman, a guy who has never pitched in a major league game in his career but the Mets signed him to a major league contract anyway because David Stearns gonna David Stearns. He went four plus innings, throwing 44 of his 61 pitches for strikes. He gave up two earned runs on four hits but struck out four. Hagenman is a decent emergency starter option that the Mets might need early in the season and hopefully not later.

José Buttó made his return to Grapefruit League action after a “minor” groin injury sidelined him for 10 days. Of course, he twice had to run to first to get batters out. He worked around a single to throw a scoreless inning with a strikeout, topping out at 95 mph. 

Dedniel Núñez (strained flexor) made his 2025 debut against legit competition and did not disappoint. He threw a 1-2-3 inning with a strikeout on 11 pitches, eight of which for strikes. His fastball went as fast as 98 mph. When asked if he is ready for Opening Day the reliever said “Sí” without hesitation. He was definitely pumped up yesterday about being back.

Britton wrote however that Núñez is likely to start the year on the injured list with A.J. Minter (hip surgery), which makes sense when you consider the Mets seem comfortably deep right now with bullpen options, and they’re super, super careful with all of the guys they got. And in any case, neither should be on it for very long. Should. 

One dude who won’t be in the bullpen on Opening Day is lefty Anthony Gose, who we talked about yesterday (we’re not called the kiss of death for nothing). Gose was cut from major league camp, along with infielder Luis De Los Santos, first baseman Joey Meneses, reliever Sean Reid-Foley (who was optioned to Triple-A last week anyway), and catcher Chris Williams, turning the competition of who will backup Luis Torrens at catcher to start the season with the Mets as a two-horse race between Hayden Senger and Jakson Reetz. With the De Los Santos move, it’s down to Brett Baty, Luisangel Acuña, and Donovan Walton for two open spots on the Opening Day roster as the starting second baseman and backup infielder. 

So with all that in mind, the eight-man bullpen to start the year looks like Edwin Díaz, Ryne Stanek, Buttó, Reed Garrett, Huascar Brazobán, Blackburn, and then two of Max Kranick, the lefties Danny Young and Génesis Cabrera, or Tyler Zuber. Before you say that doesn’t seem all that impressive, remember that this spring the Mets have had the lowest ERA in MLB, so it’s probably better than you think. 

It continues to look like second base is Brett Baty’s job to lose. Even though he went 0 for 4 at the dish, the 25-year-old who only started to play the keystone last year for a little bit in Triple-A was successful in converting all six batted balls hit his direction into outs. This play by Baty will definitely play in the bigs.

Meanwhile, while Luisangel Acuña singled twice, he managed to get picked off twice. And he committed a throwing error from his customary shortstop position. Donovan Walton made a nice play at second base against the Marlins, but he went 0 for 3, lowering his spring batting average to .194. Even after Baty’s oh-fer he’s hitting over .300.

Brandon Nimmo was supposed to only DH, but he played five innings in left field yesterday, pronouncing himself at “roughly 90 percent” and ready enough to play the field. (Of course, no balls were hit his way until the inning after he left.) I’m sharing this screenshot for both Nimmo’s beard and the impressive statistic.

Jesse Winker ended up DHing, but only for one at-bat. He seemingly tweaked his knee at first but later he was diagnosed with a calf cramp. The medical staff and Winker don’t seem to be worried. Plot armor never fails.

Not only did Jose Siri get a golden sombrero, he didn’t get to face Eric Orze, the guy he was traded for. His spring batting average is down to .129. I know he’s here for his glove, but I’m drawing a line in the sand here: if your batting average is below .200, you will not be referred to by your cool nickname. Sorry, El Rayo. (Last time, I swear.)

Francisco Lindor went 2 for 4, but he had a weird moment in the bottom of the first inning of the Mets’ eventual 2-0 loss to the Rays when he stared down the home plate umpire after he called Lindor out on strikes. It was weird because a)he could have challenged the call using the ABS system and b)

Lindor appeared on the Meet at the Apple podcast and screwed up the blind ranking game. While talking about “My Girl” as his walk-up music, he revealed that Edwin Díaz “might be ready to change” his iconic entrance music of “Narco”, but he’s too superstitious to follow through on it. 

Good.

The Mets were ranked 5th in The Athletic’s preseason power rankings. That’s not bad. What’s not great is that’s good for the third highest ranking in the NL East.

Atlanta signed old chum James McCann to a minor league contract. He’s hit the Mets well since they dumped him after the 2022 season. Should be fun.

Ed Zitron will be writing about the Mets and fandom this year for Baseball Prospectus, and that enriches us all as a society.

The Mets social media person played a way-too-intense game of Connect Four with Sean Reid-Foley on TikTok.

Alexander Canario, the outfielder who would sneak onto the Opening Day roster if Winker or Marte or Nimmo couldn’t answer the bell, walked three times and hit a 2-run homer. But he also misplayed two fly balls in left in the bottom of the ninth that almost cost the Mets the fake game.

For smashing a ball real far, Ryan Clifford was named to the Spring Breakout First Team. He was the only Met farmhand to make either the first or second team. 

25 years ago today, the Mets acquired “Super” Joe McEwing. He played every position except pitcher and catcher for the Mets, but nobody’s perfect. He famously went 11 for 44 against Randy Johnson lifetime. I would have loved to see the ABS people get an official height pegged to McEwing.

Day off today for the Metsies, and it’s supposed to be nice and sunny in NYC. A winning combination, if you ask me.