Friday, August 22

Welcome back to the Mets Beat newsletter! Anthony DiComo has covered the Mets for MLB.com since 2007, including the past 16 seasons full-time on the beat.

WASHINGTON -- Nolan McLean didn’t throw a sweeper in college. At least, he didn’t think he did.

At Oklahoma State, McLean mostly overpowered hitters with his four-seam fastball and sinker. Occasionally, he mixed in a cutter or slider, taking advantage of his natural ability to spin the ball. So big were some of his breaking pitches, in fact, that at Major League Baseball’s pre-Draft combine, a Mets official told McLean he liked the right-hander’s sweeper.

“I’m like, ‘What is a sweeper? I’ve never heard of that in my life,’” the Mets' top pitching prospect recalled.

With that, the seeds of a standout pitch were born.

As far back as high school, McLean knew he was good at spinning the ball. That spring leading up to the Draft, however, he began chasing spin with renewed focus. After his Combine meeting, McLean started tinkering in his backyard with sweeper grips. He eventually found one he liked and thought it had enough power behind it to work at a high level.

After some time, McLean had a chance to throw the pitch in front of a Trackman system, which flashed low-80s velocity and confirmed his suspicions: that thing could play.

Over the next two years, McLean perfected the sweeper and molded his curveball, establishing his Minor League reputation as one of the sport’s foremost practitioners of spin. In his MLB debut last Saturday, McLean averaged 2,995 RPMs on his sweeper and 3,279 on his curve. It’s a small sample, but for perspective, only three regular Major League starters feature higher average sweeper spin rates this season. No one has a better average curveball spin rate.

“The curveball is very unique,” Mets pitching coach Jeremy Hefner said.

For Hefner, the beauty of McLean’s curve is not necessarily its spin rate but its glove-side (right-to-left) movement, which also leads the Majors through one start. Hefner compared McLean to Phil Maton, the former Mets reliever who has made a career out of spinning glove-side curveballs. The difference is that Maton throws his curve in the mid-70s. McLean spins his around 80 mph while pairing it with a fastball that can reach the upper 90s.

“It’s very hard to teach,” Hefner said of that ability to spin. “I think a lot of it is you’re born with it. He just kind of has it.”

At the highest level, spin rates and pitch shapes don’t guarantee success. But they do make things a whole lot easier, as McLean demonstrated throughout his successful debut against the Mariners. Unlike almost every other top pitching prospect to come through New York’s system in recent years, McLean did not struggle upon reaching Triple-A. Things have likewise gone swimmingly so far in the Majors for McLean, whose next assignment will come Friday night in Atlanta in a nationally televised game.

Expect McLean to continue ripping off high-spin curveballs and sinkers in that one, as he looks to establish himself as a potential top-of-the-rotation MLB pitcher.

“It’s just something I was, I guess, blessed with,” McLean said of his ability to throw breaking pitches. “Some guys are blessed with a ton of [vertical movement] on their fastball. I’m able to spin the ball well. So I got lucky, I guess.”

Outside of McLean, which Met features the highest average spin rate on a single pitch type?

A) Reed Garrett

B) Clay Holmes

C) Gregory Soto

D) Brooks Raley

With 35 games left in the regular season, the Mets are still very much in control of their own destiny. But their path to contention won’t be easy. This weekend, they will head to Atlanta for three games against a struggling Braves team that still managed to take a series off them earlier this month. Next week, the Mets will host the first-place Phillies at Citi Field. Then, in early September, they’ll embark on a potentially season-defining road trip: three against the first-place Tigers, three against the very Reds team that’s chasing them, and four more versus the Phillies.

Asked about the Mets’ situation following a difficult, 9-3 loss to the Nationals on Thursday, Juan Soto replied: “I mean, it ain’t late. But it ain’t early, either.”

This was not how the 2025 season was supposed to go for the Mets, a team that made it within two wins of the pennant last year. Over the winter, the Mets reloaded with Soto and others, racking up a payroll north of $330 million in an attempt to establish themselves as National League bullies.

“Baseball’s hard to explain sometimes,” Jeff McNeil said. “I just feel like we’re not clicking. We haven’t gotten that momentum that we need.”

For more on the Mets’ mindset at this point, check out this piece. Then go punch a pillow, squeeze a stress ball or have a good cry -- whatever works best for you.

• Earlier this week, I answered fan questions during a lengthy Reddit AMA. You can check out the full session here, or just see some of the highlights here.

• A really cool thing happened this week at Nationals Park, where Carlos Mendoza and Miguel Cairo became the first Venezuelan-born managers to oppose each other in a Major League game. Mendoza said he was “humbled” by the history of it. Jessica Camerato had the story from Washington.

• Later that night, David Peterson became the fifth Mets starter this season to pitch into the eighth inning of a game, joining … Peterson, Peterson, Peterson and Peterson.

• A couple injury things you should know about. McNeil is dealing with a sore shoulder, which could limit his outfield play down the stretch. Brandon Nimmo has sat out most of the past two games with a stiff neck, which he doesn’t consider serious. And Jose Siri -- remember him? -- is finally due to begin a rehab assignment next week.

D) Raley

Raley’s sweeper has averaged over 2,900 RPMs this season, which leads the team outside of McLean.

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