Fan-favorite former NY Mets player has a chance to help one of MLB's worst bullpens

Superstars are viewed under a microscope in New York sports. Inexperienced, unsuccessful players who plass through on the New York Mets roster are asked to leave by the fanbase after one poor game. Then there are those who have a nice backstory and succeed.

There was a lot of crying to do about the 2025 Mets. One of the promising performances came early on.

Max Kranick, who grew up a Mets fan in the Pocono area of Pennsylvania, started off the year red hot. He did come back to earth a little bit, but still managed a 3.65 ERA before suffering a season-ending injury to his elbow. Kranick is coming back, recalled by the Washington Nationals over the All-Star Break.

Former Mets pitcher Max Kranick is back in the NL East, ready to help the horrific Nationals bullpen

With a 5.07 ERA, the Nationals own the worst bullpen core of any National League team. A few in the American League have been worse, but their 27 blown saves in 54 chances has them sitting at an unpretty 50%.

Kranick ended up signing with the Nationals in early May. The action he has gotten this year in the minors was on a rehab assignment that wasn’t so promising. Just 11.2 innings of action yielded a 5.40 ERA. It’s minimal, inconsequential, and not enough to scare the Nationals from trying to fix one of their biggest issues.

At 48-49, the Nationals are fringe trade deadline buyers. They’re 4 games out of a NL Wild Card spot which means over the next week they can better define their trade deadline status. More than likely, they get caught somewhere in between and maybe sell a few pieces.

Kranick came to the Mets in the 2023-2024 offseason as a waiver claim from the Pittsburgh Pirates. He never appeared in a major league game and was DFA’d early in the season then unclaimed and reassigned to the minor leagues where he sat and waited until he made the NLWC roster but never appeared.

The Mets and Nationals play again on August 14th then again in the final series of the season. His D.C. tenure is more likely going to end up as an extended tryout for them or other teams interested in seeing what he can do in major league games for the remainder of the season.

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