The Mets were busy in the weeks leading up to their historic 15-year deal with Juan Soto, but Queens had been strangely quiet since Soto’s memorable introductory press conference on December 12. That finally changed this week, with reports that the Mets have agreed to a three-year, $75 million deal to keep left-handed pitcher Sean Manaea in Queens after a stellar breakout campaign for the 32-year-old southpaw.
Besides their pursuit of Soto, one of the biggest storylines for the Mets entering this winter was how they would rebuild their rotation. In Manaea, Luis Severino and Jose Quintana, New York had its three top 2024 starters on free agency at the same time.
In response, the Mets first signed right-hander Frankie Montas to a two-year, $34 million deal. Then, not long after Severino signed a surprise three-year contract to lead the A’s rotation as the franchise transitioned to Sacramento, the Mets signed a second starting pitcher — and not one many expected. Clay Holmes, the recent bullpen standout for the Yankees, agreed to a three-year, $38 million deal with the Mets and will look to return to a starting role he hasn’t filled since his rookie year with Pittsburgh in 2018.
Montas and Holmes represented two intriguing steps toward assembling a new rotation, as both came with significant questions based on their recent performances and roles. But their signing seemed like a vote of confidence in the club’s pitching development infrastructure, which has begun to prove its worth with the successes of Severino and Manaea, among others.
The starting pitching market heated up considerably during the winter meetings in December. But as a flood of big contracts and blockbuster trades involving front-end weapons came and went, Manaea remained unsigned. Meanwhile, the new Mets rotation began to take shape after adding Montas, Holmes and another depth piece in Griffin Canning. Add to that an effective holdover in left-hander David Peterson and, perhaps most importantly, a hopefully healthy Kodai Senga, and the Mets appeared to have the makings of a solid starting staff. But for a club with World Series aspirations — and one that gave just $765 million to Soto — it felt light.
Manaea changes that. The real upside for this staff still largely depends on Senga’s durability, as he offers the most impactful potential. But Manaea strengthens the middle of New York’s rotation and helps balance the questions in Montas and Holmes’ profiles. And with top pitching prospect Brandon Sproat potentially knocking on the door in 2025, the Mets also have a healthy amount of depth in case of injury or underperformance.
Manaea’s huge deal to stay in Queens is another crucial plot point in a major league career that spanned both coasts but began domestically. Manaea was relatively unknown to scouts as a high school student growing up in a small town in northwest Indiana. He stayed close to home during his collegiate career, heading to Terre Haute to play for a strong Indiana State program. He won a rotation job as a freshman and broke onto the national radar with an even bigger sophomore season in 2012. The buzz in scouting circles continued to build that summer, as Manaea pitched in spectacular fashion in the prestigious Cape Cod League, sending his prospect stock skyrocketing to point where he entered the following spring as a legitimate candidate to become the first overall pick in the 2013 MLB Draft.
Injuries limited Manaea’s speed and consistency as a junior. While his supreme talent still allowed for an excellent 1.47 ERA against mid-range competition, teams became wary of investing in the breakout lefty at the top of the draft. As a result, Manaea fell to Kansas City with the 34th pick. The Royals showed their belief in his potential by giving him a $3.55 million signing bonus, the fifth-highest amount awarded to a player in the 2013 draft.
Just two years later, Manaea was traded to the A’s as the top pick in the return for Ben Zobrist, who helped the Royals win the World Series later that same year. In Oakland, Manaea established himself as a reliable starting pitcher in the big leagues, with his brightest moment coming in 2018, when he threw a no-hitter against the Red Sox. After a stellar 2021 campaign that saw him rack up 191 strikeouts in 32 starts, Manaea was the fourth and final big piece dealt during Oakland’s dramatic dismantling at the start of the 2022 season. Not long after Chris Bassitt was traded to the Mets, Matt Olson to the Braves and Matt Chapman to the Blue Jays, Manaea was sent to the Padres.
Joining an up-and-coming Padres club seemed to provide a big stage for Manaea to thrive in the final year of his contract before free agency. Instead, the southpaw took a big step back in San Diego. His 4.96 ERA in 2022 ranked 59th among 62 pitchers who threw at least 150 innings. He failed to crack the Padres’ playoff rotation and was cut by the Phillies in a disastrous relief appearance in NLCS Game 4. Instead of hitting the open market as one of the top rotation options as previously expected, he went Manaea heads to Free Agency in a much less optimistic manner. remark.
He stayed on the West Coast and signed a two-year, $25 million deal with the Giants in hopes of restoring his value. And while he bounced back and forth between the rotation and the bullpen in San Francisco, Manaea pitched well enough to opt out after 2023 and test the free-agent waters again. This time an East Coast club came calling: the Mets, needing reinforcements, offered him a two-year pact with an opt-out similar to the one he signed with San Francisco, this time for $28 million.
And in Queens, Manaea flourished. On a wonderful 2024 Mets club that had no shortage of lovable characters, Manaea was a fundamental part of the team’s success both on and off the field. The major turning point for him individually came in late July, when he watched eventual NL Cy Young winner Chris Sale dominate at Citi Field and decided to drop his own arm slot in hopes of roughly replicating the challenging arm angle that has long characterized Sale.
Having long succeeded based on guile and careful control of his arsenal more than overwhelming opponents, this adjustment took Manaea’s funk to a whole new level. He had been solid through the first four months of the 2024 season, but this mechanical adjustment, coupled with a heavier reliance on his sinker usage, allowed for a different version of him along the way. In Manaea’s next appearance and the first involving his forearm, he retired eleven Minnesota Twins in seven scoreless innings in his best start of the season.
The splits are stark:
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20 starts before dropping his arm lock: 106 IP, 3.74 ERA, 4.18 FIP, 22.6% strikeout rate, 10.1% walk rate, .671 OPS allowed
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12 starts after: 75 2/3 IP, 3.09 ERA, 3.35 FIP, 28.4% strikeout rate, 6.2% walk rate, .538 OPS allowed
This new and improved Manaea lasted into October, with the grand finale of his breakout in NLDS Game 3, when he blanked the Phillies for seven frames before departing to a raucous Citi Field in the top of the eighth. He also showed well in a win over the Dodgers in NLCS Game 2 before faltering in his second run-in with the eventual champions in Game 6. By that point, however, Manaea had earned the trust and adoration of the Mets faithful .
Since his stellar season would have him opting out and becoming a free agent for the third straight winter, it was no guarantee he would find his way back to the Mets. Ultimately, a reunion was planned. The Mets’ chapter in Manaea’s career won’t be a one-year adventure.
As for the rest of this winter, the Mets may have another major rotation addition in store; After all, Corbin Burnes is still active and Steve Cohen’s purchasing power remains more formidable than that of any other team owner. The trade market is still active, with top-tier weapons like Luis Castillo and Dylan Cease reportedly available for the right price.
It’s more likely that the next phase of the Mets’ winter will shift the focus back to their position player group. That starts primarily with free agent Pete Alonso, whose potential landing spots seem to be dwindling by the day given the recent wave of trades involving first basemen.
Pairing one of the best hitters in the world in Soto with another MVP candidate in Francisco Lindor makes the top of the Mets lineup as dangerous as anyone. Rising slugger Mark Vientos and franchise player Brandon Nimmo also represent great bats. Beyond these four, however, questions remain about the potential of the line-up as currently constituted – especially if Alonso lands elsewhere.
As important as keeping Manaea was, deciding whether or not Alonso should stay in Queens seems like a much more consequential decision.
