Mets Trade Deadline: Three arms to consider adding before the deadline

Mets Trade Candidate: Trevor Rosenthal

The third arm I think the Mets would be prudent in making a deal for would be the Royals’ closer, Trevor Rosenthal. Rosenthal is a former All-Star who was dominant out of the bullpen as a closer with the St. Louis Cardinals back in 2014 and 2015. In those two years he posted 45 and 48 save seasons for the Cardinals respectively.

A severe elbow injury and subsequent Tommy John surgery and rehabilitation cost him any chance to pitch well in 2017 and in 2018. In trying to make his come back during 2019, he was unable to find control of his pitches and struggled a lot in his stints with the Nationals and the Detroit Tigers.

Coming into 2020, Rosenthal was all but forgotten at this point  and signed a minor league contract with his hometown Kansas City Royals. He impressed early on in intrasquad games and the few spring training games the Royals played before the start of this shortened season. He showed he could hit triple digits on the radar gun with his fastball and mix it up effectively with his hard biting slider. Trevor has carried that success throughout the start of this season too.

Coming into this Friday, Rosenthal has converted 7 out of 8 save opportunities and is averaging 12.4 strikeouts per nine innings. His ERA is just a little over 3.00. But most of that was due to one bad save appearance a few days back, as he was dominating before that. Having a reliable closer like that at the back end of the bullpen will help the Mets greatly in these tightly contested late-inning games.

As of now, the Mets have gone with more of a bullpen by committee approach when it comes to closing their games with mixed results. Having that stable and reliable ninth inning guy will be a good change for this ball club, as it is usually a hallmark trait of successful baseball clubs.

The best part is I don’t think the Mets would have to give up a Dom Smith or an Andres Giminez type of talent to acquire Rosenthal. The Royals right now are looking for cheap and youthful prospects at all positions.

If the Mets are willing to part with a few teenage A-ball outfield prospects and maybe a pitcher like Corey Oswalt and Franklyn Kilome in a package deal – they could bring back both Rosenthal and a Jacob Junis type of pitcher. Both Junis and Rosenthal could go a long way to helping the Mets fill some much needed weak spots for now.

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What moves would you the fans like to see the Mets make? Perhaps there are some more under the radar players you wouldn’t mind them taking a crack at.