JUPITER, Fla. — Blade Tidwell has the name and the stuff to be a big leaguer starting pitcher, but the fireballing 24-year-old now has to prove he has the command too.
The Mets’ eighth-ranked prospect, Tidwell made the first Grapefruit League start of his career Monday against the St. Louis Cardinals, showcasing a blistering fastball with a simplified pitch mix. He touched 99 on the gun and allowed three earned runs on four hits, walking one and striking out one, with all three runs coming via a home run by Luken Baker.
However, of the 30 pitches he threw, 19 were strikes, which might have been the most encouraging aspect of his start. Tidwell has been wild since coming out of college in 2022, at one point owning the highest walk rate among all Mets minor leaguers at nearly 13%, but going from eight pitches to five should help him with control in 2025.
“He was around the zone, and that’s something that from Day 1, coming into camp, he knew he needed the work on,” said manager Carlos Mendoza. “To go out there and watch him do that against a pretty good lineup — you’ve got, pretty much, their [main] players there — he was on the attack the whole time and he was aggressive.”
St. Louis had many of their big league hitters in the lineup, including Masyn Winn, Nolan Arenado, Iván Herrera and Jordan Walker, with Tidwell hitting 99 MPH with his four-seam fastball against Arenado. He didn’t back down to any of them, and the home run ball was somewhat wind-aided, plus the fences were recently brought in at Roger Dean Chevrolet Stadium.
“It was pretty calm before the game and leading up to the game,” Tidwell said. “Even when I gave up that home run, I was still calm out there.”
Tidwell got off to a good start in Double-A Binghamton last season, but the promotion to Triple-A proved challenging. The Tennessee native posted a 5.93 ERA and walked 5.6 hitters per nine innings, attributing his struggles to being unsure of where his focus should have been. With eight pitches, Tidwell was doing too much.
“Think I was just trying to work on a lot of different things — too many things, at that,” Tidwell said. “By the end of the year, I kind of narrowed my sights in and focused on what I need to do to get to the next level.”
Tidwell dropped the arch slider and the cutter, and he stopped trying to seam-shift with his changeup, while keeping a four-seam fastball, a two-seam fastball, a slider, sweeper and he found the right grip for his changeup. He sits around 96-97 MPH with his fastball, but can throw harder when needed.
However, throwing a 96 MPH fastball in the zone is more preferable to throwing a 100 MPH fastball outside of it, so the next step for Tidwell is simply to control the zone.
QUICK HITTERS
– The Mets fell 7-4 against St. Louis, with former Mets’ left-hander Steven Matz throwing two scoreless innings with one walk. His former teammate Pete Alonso drew that walk in the first inning.
– Alonso drove in two runs off right-hander Ryan Helsley in the third inning with a line-drive double to center field, scoring Rafael Ortega from third base and Juan Soto from first. In his second Grapefruit League game of the spring slate, third base coach Mike Sarbaugh was able to easily wave the star outfielder around third to score with his efficient baserunning.
Mendoza found this to be beneficial as the Mets work on communication with new players throughout spring training.
“For him to just give Sarby a chance to wave him home, it goes to show you that he’s feeling good,” Mendoza said. “I checked with him and he was like, ‘I’m ready to go.’ So, yeah, it was good.”
– Jose Butto and Huascar Brazobán pitched scoreless innings in relief of Tidwell. Brazobán is competing for a spot in the Mets’ bullpen, with the Mets hoping for more consistency from the right-hander this season. A late-blooming 35-year-old, Brazobán’s calling card is his ability to suppress hard contact. He threw 17 pitches in his first Grapefruit League appearance of the year, with the hardest-hit ball clocking it at only 76.3 MPH off the bat.