2 NY Mets prospects on track for MLB debut, 1 who'll have to wait until 2026

The New York Mets are set to promote one of their top pitching prospects. Blade Tidwell was promoted to the big leagues and will make his first start in the Major. Tidwell is ranked as the Mets’ 14th-best prospect per Baseball America and their 15th-best per MLB Pipeline. Despite an ERA of 5.00 at Triple-A Syracuse, Tidwell struck out over 30% of opponents with a respectable 8.5% walk rate and 0.67 HR/9.

The season, however, is far from over, and Tidwell is just one prospect who will likely make his MLB debut this season. The Mets have plenty of more prospects in the minor leagues that will likely see their first games in the big leagues before the end of the year. However, while this one Met ranks as one of their best, we may have to wait until 2026 to see him appear at the game’s highest level.

Drew Gilbert will be in the majors this year

Drew Gilbert was acquired in the Justin Verlander trade. After a very promising 2023 season, where he had an .868 OPS, .389 wOBA, and 133 wRC+, Gilbert went into 2024 as a consensus top 100 prospect, ranking as high as #29 on Baseball Prospectus’ top 100 list. Despite entering 2024 with high expectations, the season did not go very well for the outfield prospect.

Gilbert was only healthy enough to appear in 62 games and tally 269 plate appearances. Not only did he miss a large chunk of time due to a hamstring injury, but Gilbert didn’t perform well when he was healthy enough to take the field. He only slashed .205/.313/.371 with a 79 wRC+. He still drew plenty of walks with an 11.2% BB% and only struck out 20.1% of the time, but he saw his isolated slugging percentage fall from .199 in ‘23 to only .166 in ‘24.

Gilbert has 81 plate appearances on the season. He opened 2025 at A-Ball St. Luice, where he collected nine hits in 27 plate appearances. He only struck out three times with three walks, and four of his hits were extra-base hits. That includes two doubles and two homers. After that, the Mets sent Gilbert back to Syracuse, where he’s continued his scorching hot start. His most recent 54 plate appearances have yielded 11 more hits with a home run and three doubles. He’s also drawn more walks than strikeouts, with ten free passes to only nine K’s.

The Mets could see Gilbert arrive sooner rather than later. They’re down one outfielder in Jose Siri, who suffered a fractured tibia in late April. Jose Azocar is hitting well, but it’s in a small sample size, and he only had a .610 OPS in nearly 400 plate appearances with the San Diego Padres from 2022 through 2024. Tyrone Taylor is struggling out of the gates as well.