With the team in dire need of a proven ace to lead their starting rotation, the New York Mets made one of the biggest trades of last offseason, acquiring Freddy Peralta from the Milwaukee Brewers in exchange for a pair of top prospects in Jett Williams and Brandon Sproat. You know what happened next: Peralta had a 4.99 ERA in 22 starts for a Mets team that was all but out of postseason contention by May, leading the team to trade him away to the Tampa Bay Rays at the trade deadline.
From there, Peralta turned into the pitcher Mets fans expected him to be in New York, pitching so well that he won the ALCS MVP award after throwing 12 innings of one-run ball in three appearances (two starts) against the Guardians. How should these teams feel about this deal now? FanSided's Mark Powell gave the Rays a B- and the Mets a C+ for this trade at the time. It's safe to say the regrade looks quite different for both sides.
Rays' Freddy Peralta trade regrade
While Powell was spot-on in declaring the Rays winners, he (through no fault of his own) underestimated just how big that win would be. Peralta went from pitching like one of the worst qualified starters in the sport to giving the Rays ace-like production, and it happened almost instantly. He debuted with Tampa in Mets-like fashion, allowing seven runs in 3.2 innings at Coors Field, but had a 2.26 ERA in his final nine regular season starts and a 0.79 ERA in his final six. He pitched so well in September that he was named the AL Pitcher of the Month.
Obviously, Peralta has been even better in the postseason, as his 1.08 ERA in four appearances (three starts) would indicate. In a star-studded rotation that includes Drew Rasmussen, Nick Martinez and Griffin Jax, Peralta has shone brightest, helping the Rays win the AL Pennant and earn a date with, ironically enough, the Brewers in the Fall Classic.
Trading for a rental, especially one pitching as poorly as Peralta, comes with serious risk, but the Rays knocked it out of the park. There's a real chance they'd have been sent home by Cleveland in the ALCS if it weren't for the righty, as Tampa Bay won all three games he appeared in this series. With his postseason contributions in mind, giving the Rays anything but an A+ in our regrade would be completely foolish.
Tampa Bay Rays regrade: A+
Mets' Freddy Peralta trade regrade
From a Mets perspective, this is much more complicated. Obviously, Peralta's success in Tampa Bay looks bad for everyone in the Mets' organization. The Rays had him make immediate changes like throwing more change-ups and having him pitch exclusively from the stretch (to name a couple), and the results were nothing short of tremendous and immediate. With that being said, even if Peralta were pitching well for the Mets, they'd still have traded him at the deadline since the team wasn't any good, so all we can do is evaluate who New York traded to get him and who they got for him when they flipped him.
On the surface, again, the Mets look bad when evaluating the packages, as Jett Williams and Brandon Sproat are bigger names than those the team received in return for Peralta.
Should that be the case, though? I mean, Sproat pitched so poorly (5.57 ERA in 22 appearances and 19 starts) in the big leagues that the Brewers sent him down to the Minors and did not include him on their postseason roster. Williams, a consensus top-100 prospect who was seen as close to big-league-ready, hit just nine home runs with a .723 OPS in 81 games for Triple-A Nashville. Williams did not play well enough to earn a call-up and ended the year on the IL, although he's played in seven games at the Arizona Fall League (and gone 3-for-27 with 10 strikeouts).
Sure, the Mets could've potentially flipped Sproat and Williams for a player who'd have provided more impact in Queens than Peralta did, but had the Mets kept them, would they really be in a better spot than they are with the prospects they got when trading Peralta? Pitre, the star of the latter package, hit over .300 with 35 stolen bases in the upper Minors this season and could easily find a spot in the Mets' infield as soon as next year. Of the five prospects Peralta was traded for when combining the two deals, Pitre might well be the best one.
Now, the other two prospects the Mets got for Peralta might not amount to much, but there are some signs of hope. Smith's stock has fallen in recent years, but he did show signs of life after being acquired by New York, hitting five home runs with a .938 OPS in 21 games at High-A. As for Gary Gill Hill, his ceiling isn't particularly high, but he pitched well for the Mets in the upper Minors and could easily be a depth piece for the team in 2027. As second and third pieces in a trade for a struggling rental, that's not bad.
Would I, a Mets fan, have liked it if Peralta had pitched well in New York? Of course. Is it frustrating to see him now look like the pitcher New York envisioned when acquiring him? You bet. However, the team wouldn't have been much better even if he had met expectations, and when comparing packages, you can at least make the argument that the Mets got more for him than what they gave up to get him in hindsight. Given that, their regrade isn't too bad.
New York Mets trade regrade: B
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