Inside The Mets

Ex-Mets Ace Predicted to Join AL Contender

New York Mets vital 2024 starter Sean Manaea has been predicted to sign with a top team in free agency.

Grant Young

Oct 20, 2024; Los Angeles, California, USA; New York Mets pitcher Sean Manaea (59) walks to the dugout after being relieved in the third inning against the Los Angeles Dodgers during game six of the NLCS for the 2024 MLB playoffs at Dodger Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Jayne Kamin-Oncea-Imagn Images
Oct 20, 2024; Los Angeles, California, USA; New York Mets pitcher Sean Manaea (59) walks to the dugout after being relieved in the third inning against the Los Angeles Dodgers during game six of the NLCS for the 2024 MLB playoffs at Dodger Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Jayne Kamin-Oncea-Imagn Images / Jayne Kamin-Oncea-Imagn Images
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The New York Mets have already lost one of their three best starting pitchers from last season, as Luis Severino signed a three-year, $67 million deal with the A's back on December 5.

Severino was one of three members of the Mets' rotation who entered free agency this offseason, with the other two being Jose Quintana and Sean Manaea. It remains to be seen whether the Mets will try and re-sign either of these two, but given the success they both had in 2024, there will likely be large markets for them both.

According to a December 13 article from Bleacher Report's Kerry Miller, Manaea could soon be headed to one of the American League's best teams.

"Prediction: 4 years, $76M to the Baltimore Orioles," Miller wrote to forecast Manaea's future.

"Per Baseball Savant, Manaea added a cutter to what is now a six-pitch repertoire, leaned more on his sweeper than he had in the past and went back to the sinker as his go-to pitch after mostly throwing a four-seamer in 2022 and 2023. And it worked wonders, with one of the 30 Cy Young voters even throwing him a fifth-place vote for the first of his career.

"If the soon-to-be 33-year-old can harness that for another few years, he'd be an absolute steal at either 3/$60M or 4/$72M," Miller added.

"Giving Corbin Burnes more than $200M probably isn't in the cards for Baltimore, but this type of deal to pair Manaea with Zach Eflin and Grayson Rodriguez atop the rotation could absolutely work for the O's."

This isn't the first time Sean Manea has been linked to the Orioles. And given how the pairing seems to make a lot of sense for both sides, it might not be the last.

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Grant Young
GRANT YOUNG

Grant Young covers the New York Yankees, the New York Mets, and Women’s Basketball for Sports Illustrated’s ‘On SI’ sites. He holds an MFA degree in creative writing from the University of San Francisco, where he also played Division 1 baseball for five years. He believes Mark Teixeira should have been a first ballot MLB Hall of Fame inductee.

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