PORT ST. LUCIE — The Mets and Yankees hopped on the subway Sunday to address their respective bullpen needs.
In a rare major league trade between the interborough rivals, the Mets acquired left-handed reliever Joely Rodriguez from the Yankees for right-hander Miguel Castro.
Rodriguez, 30, appeared in 52 games combined last season for the Rangers and Yankees and pitched to a 4.66 ERA. He will join Alex Claudio and Chasen Shreve as the lefty relief options in Mets camp.
“We liked how [Rodriguez] is on left-handed hitters,” Mets general manager Billy Eppler said. “He can be very deceptive with that delivery, that arm slot, the component of the fastball. How the fastball behaves and how left-handed hitters react to it. It looks like he can be somebody that can help us a lot, so we grabbed him.”
Castro, 27, pitched to a 3.45 ERA in 69 appearances for the Mets last season. He will join Chad Green, Clay Holmes and Jonathan Loaisiga as right-handed setup options with the Yankees.
The Yankees traded lefty Joely Rodriguez to the Mets. Charles Wenzelberg/New York Post
The Mets traded righty Miguel Castro to the Yankees. Corey Sipkin“[Castro] is good,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said. “He’s coming off a great season last year. We’re pretty familiar with him, just facing him with the Mets and Baltimore for a lot of those years. A guy with great stuff and I think it deepens our pen a little bit.”
The last previous swap of major league players between the Yankees and Mets occurred in 2004, when relievers Mike Stanton and Felix Heredia changed boroughs. The teams traded minor leaguers in 2018, with L.J. Mazzilli going to the Yankees for Kendall Coleman.
“We were serving each other’s needs is what it seemed like to me,” Eppler said of the latest trade. “[The Yankees] wanted to get a little more right-handed, we wanted to get left-handed and just the circumstances aligned.”
— Additional reporting by Greg Joyce
