Tylor Megill is in familiar territory trying to win a job in the Mets rotation out of camp. Last year, the year before that and even the year before that one, Megill appeared to be on the outside looking in, yet the right-hander has always managed to break camp with the team, even pitching in two home openers.
However, Megill has yet to spend an entire season in the big leagues. Early in his career it was injuries that limited him, but since 2023, it’s been a lack of consistency. His career splits are a bit confounding, with the 28-year-old Southern California native putting up extra strong numbers in April before posting high ERAs and high walk rates in May and June, good numbers in July, but bad numbers in August, followed by strong numbers in September and October again.
However, the Mets have not lost their belief in Megill. With the help of pitching coach Jeremy Hefner, Megill has maintained belief in himself as well.
“It’s being confident in your stuff and your strengths,” Megill recently told the Daily News in Port St. Lucie.
On paper, the soft-spoken Megill is everything you want in a starting pitcher. The Mets like his athletic background, with a sister who played volleyball at USC, a brother who pitches for the Milwaukee Brewers and a father who was a college rower at UCLA. He’s big and strong at 6-foot-7, 230 pounds, and he throws hard, sitting around 95 MPH with his four-seam fastball. He also throws a lot of pitches — about eight of them.
His stuff is good, but the problem is the usage. Coming into 2025, the Mets want Megill to simplify his pitch package. The fastball is good, but the cutter got hit hard, with middle-order hitters doing damage on the pitch he used more than any other except for the fastball. The splitter was an effective putaway pitch when used in the right counts, but he threw the “American Spork” at times when it wasn’t the optimal option, forcing the pitch in a bad spot.
“Last year, I was using it a lot, even ahead in counts,” Megill said. “It’s a contact pitch, get them on the ground and put the ball in play. But a lot of them were getting hit.”
Megill isn’t abandoning the cutter, but he’s learning how to deploy it more effectively. To do that, he’s looking at how Zack Wheeler uses the pitch. The two have a similar repertoire with similar movement and pitch shapes, so Megill is studying how the former Mets right-hander sequences his pitches.
“I always end up going back to Wheeler just because I kind of have the same pitching personality,” Megill said. “Seeing what he’s doing with those pitch breaks or splits and all his pitches. And it’s kind of like what we were thinking is, he uses his fastball a lot, but his cutter, he uses it here and there, he uses a splitter here and there, but the majority is four-seam, sinker and sweeper.”
Megill has made two spring starts and allowed only one earned run (1.35 ERA). With injuries to Frankie Montas and Sean Manaea, he’s likely going to end up on the Opening Day roster once again. However, he does have one minor league option year left, so the Mets could opt to stash him in Triple-A early in the season when they have a handful of off days.
If ever there was a season to prove himself, it’s this one.
GRAPEFRUIT LEAGUE RESULTS
Right-hander Paul Blackburn bounced back from a couple rough outings by throwing four perfect innings against the St. Louis Cardinals in Jupiter on Wednesday. While healthy, Blackburn has still had to adjust after undergoing surgery to repair a spinal fluid leak in his mid-back last fall. The Cardinals made some hard contact, especially with his curveball, but once he settled into the outing, he was able to get groundball outs on his sinker and cutter.
Left-handed reliever A.J. Minter made his first Grapefruit League appearance, throwing one scoreless inning.
The Mets defeated St. Louis 2-0 using an RBI single by Francisco Lindor and a ninth-inning home run by William Lugo.
WELCOME BACK, CAP
David Wright donned a Mets uniform for the first time since his final game in 2018 on Wednesday, when he made an appearance at camp as a guest instructor. The former captain typically makes one trip to Port St. Lucie every year, typically as a team ambassador. This time, he’s on the field working with players, with manager Carlos Mendoza finally convincing the former third baseman to play a bigger role in spring training.
“As a player, I appreciate the older players or the former players coming around, but I know for some guys they’re so laser-focused each day of spring on the task at hand that it’s another distraction,” Wright told reporters. “I never wanted to get in the way of guys getting their work in… I don’t ever want to feel like I’m getting in the way.”
Wright is impressed with the team, saying he would love to be a part of the lineup,
The Mets are set to retire Wright’s No. 5 and induct him into the team hall of fame in a dual ceremony July 19 at Citi Field.