A disappointing 2026 season is almost certainly resulting in a deadline sale for the Mets. They’re 15 games under .500 and have been one of the five worst teams in MLB for the past calendar year. It already resulted in a managerial change, but owner Steve Cohen says he has no plans to overhaul the front office.

The Mets made the most notable move of the early deadline season, flipping David Peterson to the Cubs for first base prospect Cole Mathis last week. They said that wasn’t the start of a deadline fire sale, but they’ve gone 2-5 since the trade. Peterson was an obvious first player to go — he’s an impending free agent whom the Mets tried to bump from their rotation twice this season. It’d take a miraculous July for them to avoid shipping more players out the door in a couple weeks.

As MLBTR’s Steve Adams explored in a post for Front Office subscribers last month, they’re not exactly overflowing with high-end trade chips. A lot of the problems fall into one of two categories: veterans underperforming big contracts or young players who have regressed. There’s not going to be much interest in the former, and the Mets would need to weigh the possibility of selling low on players in the latter bucket. Even the Mets’ clearest “big” trade candidate is struggling through his worst season in six years.

Record: 36-51 (3.2% playoff odds, per FanGraphs)

Sell Mode

Potential impending Free Agents: Freddy Peralta, Clay Holmes (opt-out), Bo Bichette (opt-out), A.J. Minter, Brooks Raley, Tyrone Taylor

Peralta should be one of the deadline’s marquee trade chips. He’s an impending free agent playing on an $8MM salary who has been a top-of-the-rotation starter for the past few seasons. The Mets surrendered a couple borderline Top 100 prospects (Brandon Sproat, Jett Williams) to acquire him from Milwaukee in January. They weren’t going to recoup quite the same value at the deadline, but a standard Peralta season would have made him the top alternative to Tarik Skubal on the trade front.

If that’s still the case, it’s more by default than a reflection of his current form. Peralta has been rocked in three of his last five outings and has a 4.81 earned run average across 18 starts. His 21.8% strikeout rate is easily a personal low, essentially league average for the first time in his career. He’s having a tougher time missing bats in the strike zone and has had a difficult time turning lineups over a third time.

Peralta’s pre-2026 track record, affordability, and the sheer volume of pitching needs around the league mean he’ll still get a lot of attention on the trade front. As luxury tax payors, the Mets would only recoup a compensatory pick after the fourth round if he declines a qualifying offer and walks as a free agent. They’ll easily beat that minimal value in a trade, so he’s a near-lock to move this summer, but he’s not exactly elevating his stock each time he takes the ball.