Laura Albanese: Mets' Freddy Peralta has the personality to bring fun back to Flushing
Former Brewers pitcher and current Met Freddy Peralta in the dugout after being taken out of a game against the Nationals on July 13 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Credit: Getty Images/John Fisher
It was the ghost that haunted the Mets for the majority of this offseason — not just their historic collapse, though that stain isn’t going anywhere for a while — but the "why."
Why did a team with so much talent, one that had so much chemistry the year prior, become the limp shell of a disemboweled purple mascot?
There are good baseball reasons — injuries and inconsistencies meant that, for the latter half of the year, their pitching was nothing short of a liability. But there were questions about clubhouse culture, too. President of baseball operations David Stearns wasn’t shy about blowing up the core, and toward the tail end of the season, it became clear that all was not well in Flushing.
There was a New York Post report about an altercation between Jeff McNeil and Francisco Lindor. Within the clubhouse, Lindor and Juan Soto certainly seemed cordial, but hardly best friends. In an episode of “The Show” podcast with Jon Heyman and Joel Sherman, manager Carlos Mendoza referred to it as “a corporate clubhouse . . . Guys respected each other, but I don’t think we celebrated each other enough.”
Enter Freddy Peralta.
Peralta, who joins the Mets after the trade that sent Jett Williams and Brandon Sproat to Milwaukee, barreled into his introductory Zoom news conference Tuesday with a bright smile and all the right answers.
The righthander, who’s on an expiring contract, has already been in contact with a number of his new teammates, and “they’re making me feel part of the family already,” he said.
“I spoke with Tyrone Taylor, he FaceTimed me, Lindor, [Sean] Manaea, [Francisco] Alvarez, Soto — all of them,” he said. “I got a call from them . . . They welcomed me really well and I can’t lie, it makes me feel really good and I told them — I can’t wait to be with you guys together and have fun together.”
Fun. Remember when there was fun in Flushing?
It may seem like a small thing, but it’s no small part of Peralta’s repertoire. Stearns wouldn’t trade for a guy twice if he was a clubhouse cancer (he acquired Peralta when he was the Brewers general manager in 2015). And in a video posted to SNY’s social media accounts a few days ago, Peralta noted that after day games, his Brewers teammates would flock to his house for dinner. “Sometimes, they don’t even ask,” he said. “Just, ‘What time?’ ”
Everyone on the Brewers knew where they were going following a day game in Milwaukee...
— SNY Mets (@SNY_Mets) January 22, 2026
Freddy Peralta's house
(via @MLB, h/t @runwildkian) pic.twitter.com/EOpfNrA644
Of course, none of this matters if Peralta wasn’t also a very, very good pitcher. The two-time All-Star was 17-6 last year with a 2.70 ERA, averaged 10.4 strikeouts per nine, and had an ERA+ of 154. While he doesn’t often go long into games — averaging a little more than five innings per start last year — he’s one of baseball’s most durable arms, having started 30 or more games in the last three seasons. His bona fides edge him toward “ace” category, though maybe not in the most typical sense.
And while intangibles can often be overblown — let’s face it, the nicest guy in the world isn’t going to make a bad team good — they do become a factor when you’re trying to survive the psychological rigors of a long season where failure is the norm.
Which brings us to last year.
If there was truly one thing that distinguished that clubhouse from the rollicking one of the year prior, it was the lack of “energy” guys — the players that help keep this loose in a naturally stressful environment. And look, trying to manufacture clubhouse chemistry via roster construction is a dangerous and often futile game, but it doesn’t hurt to have a few proven glue guys on board.
Marcus Semien, acquired for Brandon Nimmo, is widely respected as a veteran "adult in the room" type. Bo Bichette is professional and focused, and by all accounts, Peralta is effusive and fun.
Already on Tuesday, he was talking excitedly about having so many fellow Latinos on the team, and playing in front of this fan base. “What makes me feel good is playing for New York, where we have a bunch of Latinos,” he said. “They challenge us to be better every day.”
He seemed genuinely happy to be here, genuinely excited to get going, and genuinely pleased with the people he’s going to get to play with.
There wasn’t a whole lot of that in the waning months of last season, and the further the Mets can get from 2025, the better.
Laura Albanese is the Mets beat writer for Newsday. She's been covering MLB since 2014 after starting at Newsday as an intern seven years earlier.
