Overlooked Padres free agent is a more realistic option for the NY Mets than Adrian Morejon

The San Diego Padres have a free agent class full of options for the New York Mets. Starting pitcher Michael King, reliever/potential starting pitcher Adrian Morejon, and first baseman Ty France are all names you’ve probably already seen mentioned as matches for New York. Their short-term approach with some players as well as coincidental timing with others and the fact they bought at the trade deadline gives them a deep class of available players.

Someone who hasn’t gotten much attention is Jason Adam. Somewhat overlooked and largely because he missed time last year due to injury, he managed to appear in 38 games for San Diego while pitching to a 2.62 ERA. It’s slightly better than his 2.68 ERA for his career which began in 2018 but took off as a member of the Tampa Bay Rays in 2022. He cost the Padres a haul at the 2024 trade deadline thanks to two and a half seasons of control and a status as one of the rising top bullpen arms in the game.

A warning sign yet also plenty of positives, he’s probably the more realistic match for the Mets in free agency than Morejon.

The pros and cons of what Jason Adam can bring to the Mets

Since 2022, Adam is a 9.2 bWAR player with a 2.13 ERA in 300 games. A 0.96 WHIP during this time frame with 2.9 BB/9 and 9.8 K/9, he has wonderful peripherals to back up the ability to prevent runs.

He has become an above-average ground ball pitcher who has consistently had superior whiff numbers. It doesn’t come from just one pitch either. Slider heavy in the last two seasons, he was at a 37.3% whiff rate for his most commonly used pitch. His changeup at 30.5% complemented it well.

Roughed up in June last season with 7 of his 10 earned runs taking place in that month, one has to wonder if the shoulder injury that caused him to miss all of July and August plus most of September was one reason. He tossed 12 scoreless innings in May.

In 2024, Adam was averaging 95.5 mph on his four-seamer. It fell in 2025 and went down even lower in 2026 to 93.5 mph. An effective pitch for him in the past with multiple seasons of batters hitting under .200 against it, they managed to clobber an .864 slugging percentage against the fastball with a .273 batting average this past year. The solution here might be to use the pitch even less. Adam has a sweeper in his arsenal as well which has been effective in the past. Using that more, or adding another pitch, can help extend his career.

Easily the most alarming number of Adam’s from last season was only a 5.8 K/9 rate. The 1.3 HR/9 was a tad higher than league average, but in an abbreviated year, that can get explained away from one bad stretch in June. The strikeouts going M.I.A. are a bit of a concern. He didn’t have any in his 3.1 postseason innings despite allowing only a single earned run.

Adam is at the phase of his career where it probably makes sense to sign a short one-year deal with a possible team option for a second. Spotrac has him at a market value of $8.7 million on a single-year contract. That’s a good ballpark estimate.

Morejon could end up with a qualifying offer which steals two Mets draft picks and international bonus slot money. If teams view him as a starter or closer, he’ll easily make more money than we should expect the Mets to sign him for. Adam is proven and despite some shaky analytics, can become a worthwhile investment. He’s probably more in the style of secondary, searching for a lower cost option with upside coming off of a bad year than the haymaker we’re hoping for. The Mets can afford to add one of those types of pitchers, especially if he is accompanied by someone more in his peak than over that mountain.

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