Mets To Designate Rico Garcia For Assignment

The Mets are set to designate right-hander Rico Garcia for assignment according to a report from Joel Sherman of the New York Post. Garcia’s departure opens up spots on both the 40-man and active rosters, but it’s not yet clear what the corresponding move will be to replace Garcia.

Garcia, 31, was a 30th-round pick by the Rockies back in 2016 who made the majors with Colorado during the 2019 season. The journeyman has gone on to pitch in parts of five big league seasons over the past seven years with seven different organizations but has never pitched more than a handful of times in a single season. He’s accrued exactly 50 innings of work overall in his MLB career, and in that time he’s pitched to a 5.94 ERA with a 6.09 FIP for the Rockies, Giants, Orioles, A’s, Nationals, Yankees, and Mets.

Weak as those overall numbers may be, Garcia has actually pitched quite well during his time in Queens. In 11 2/3 innings of work across seven outings, Garcia entered today with a 0.77 ERA while punching out 35.7% of his opponents. It’s an extremely small sample, of course, but that dominance could be enough to create optimism that Garcia has figured something out. Of course, the right-hander’s DFA comes off the back of a performance where he surrendered two runs on two hits while recording a strikeout in one inning of work. Even that weak performance leaves him with a 3.52 ERA, a 3.23 FIP, and a 30% strikeout rate across 15 1/3 innings of work this season between the Mets and the Yankees.

If those solid numbers (albeit in a somewhat limited body of work) sell a club on Garcia’s ability to contribute to their bullpen, they’ll have the opportunity to claim the right-hander once the Mets place him on waivers. If he goes unclaimed on waivers, the Mets could send him outright to Triple-A. With that being said, Garcia has been outrighted to the minor leagues before and could reject an outright assignment in favor of free agency if he so chooses. If he did so, he would then be free to sign with any of the league’s 30 clubs. If a team picks him up and his success continues, Garcia can theoretically be controlled through the end of the 2030 season and won’t be eligible for arbitration until after the 2026 season at the earliest.

While Castillo is certainly a player who’s flashed some interesting upside this year, the Mets figure to do just fine without him in their bullpen. Star closer Edwin Diaz still leads the club’s bullpen, which was reinforced heavily at the trade deadline this past week by the additions of southpaw Gregory Soto as well as high-leverage arms Ryan Helsley and Tyler Rogers. That quartet figures to pair with Brooks Raley and Ryne Stanek to form one of the better bullpens in the entire sport down the stretch this year.