Mets acquire pitchers Paul Blackburn, Tyler Zuber, Huascar Brazoban at MLB trade deadline
Athletics starting pitcher Paul Blackburn throws during the first inning of a game against the Angels in Anaheim, Calif., on Friday. Credit: AP/Eric Thayer
As the clock ticked past 6 p.m. Tuesday, the final moments for the rest of baseball season that clubs were allowed to swap players, the Mets’ trade-deadline haul felt much the same as it did in the days prior: a bunch of smaller deals, no huge splashes.
They squeezed in three more trades in the last hours, acquiring starting pitcher Paul Blackburn (from the Athletics) plus relievers Huascar Brazoban (Marlins) and Tyler Zuber (Rays).
Altogether, the Mets brought in six players — nearly one-quarter of the roster — to prepare for a two-month playoff push. Blackburn, Brazoban and Zuber join outfielder Jesse Winker, reliever Phil Maton and reliever Ryne Stanek as new Mets.
None are stars. All would seem to help.
“In this situation, given the players that were available, given the prices [of] certain players, we felt like this was the right course to take,” president of baseball operations David Stearns said. “And the transactions that we were able to execute were the right ones to do.”
Manager Carlos Mendoza said: “I feel like we’re in a better position now.”
Perhaps just as interesting were the moves the Mets did not make. They didn’t add a frontline starter in the wake of another injury to Kodai Senga. They didn’t add a reliever with a track record of late-inning excellence. They didn’t add any lefty pitchers.
The Mets explored such trades, Stearns said, as a matter of routine. But they didn’t go for any largely because of what he called “some pretty aggressive pricing” on the part of teams willing to deal higher-end players. And the Mets were not interested in sacrificing their possible future success — i.e., their top prospects — to further bolster these Mets.
In his first deadline go-around with the Mets, Stearns considered going bigger but decided against it.
“Every single one of our top prospects was asked about multiple times,” he said. “We don’t take anyone off the table. There’s not an organizational philosophy to just say we’re not going to talk about [a given player]. I think that ties your hands a little bit.
“But clearly we value some of our top prospects very highly. We think they’re going to contribute here for a long time and we were very mindful of that as we went through the process.”
In line with their overall approach in recent weeks, the cost again was minimal for the Mets, who traded one mid-tier prospect in each deal. Righthander Kade Morris went to Oakland, infielder/outfielder Wilfredo Lara went to Miami and righthander Paul Gervase went to Tampa Bay. None ranked among the Mets’ best minor-leaguers.
Blackburn, a 30-year-old righthander, has a 4.41 ERA in nine starts this season. He returned last week from a 10-week absence caused by a stress reaction in his right foot. In his lone start since, he gave up four runs in five innings to the Angels.
Stearns described Blackburn as “an incredibly consistent pitcher” who has “a kind of a kitchen-sink approach to what he does.” He has six pitches that he throws at least 10% of the time.
“We think he’s gonna fit into our rotation quite nicely,” Stearns added. He wasn’t sure if that will be the conventional five or a six-man rotation.
Sean Manaea said of Blackburn, his former Athletics teammate: “I’m super excited about that . . . He’s pretty quiet, but brings a consistent behavior. Good person to have.”
After the Mets lost Senga to a left calf strain that will cost him at least the rest of the regular season, Stearns said he realized “you’re never going to replace a pitcher like Senga at the deadline.”
“We just tried to figure out how best to fortify our team around it,” Stearns said. “That meant both in the rotation and the bullpen to ensure that we had enough arms and some flexibility in various roles to put us in the best position for the next few months and hopefully beyond.”
Notably, Blackburn is under team control for 2025, too, so the Mets can pencil him into their rotation for next year. That is important given that Manaea, Luis Severino and Jose Quintana can be free agents after this season.
The deal for Brazoban, similarly, was about more than just the rest this season. He is not scheduled to be a free agent until after 2028, meaning he could be a long-term bullpen piece.
The righthanded Brazoban, 34, is having his best season yet, posting a 2.93 ERA in 20 appearances, frequently covering multiple innings.
Zuber, a 29-year-old righthander, opened the season with the Long Island Ducks before signing with the Rays. He dominated in Triple-A — 2.49 ERA, 29 strikeouts in 21 2⁄3 innings — and got called up last week. That was his first time in the majors since 2021.
The Mets traded for four relievers this month. Brazoban and Zuber can be optioned to the minors; Stearns wasn’t sure right after the deadline passed whether they’d start their Mets life in the majors.
With Sean Reid-Foley, Reed Garrett and Dedniel Nunez expected to return from the injured list — probably in that order — in the coming days and weeks, what has been a middling bullpen could get awfully crowded awfully fast.
“It’s probably quantity and quality,” Stearns said, “if we’re doing this right.”
Tim Healey is the Mets beat writer for Newsday. Born on Long Island and raised in Connecticut, Tim has previously worked for the South Florida Sun Sentinel, the Boston Globe and MLB.com. He is also the author of “Hometown Hardball,” a book about minor league baseball in the northeast.
