Peralta Perfect, Williams Tests Cutter in Spring Debuts

Two notable Mets offseason pitching additions made their spring training debuts on Friday.

One’s outing went as well as you could have hoped. The other got a rude awakening.

Freddy Peralta and Devin Williams both pitched in real, live baseball games for the New York Mets for the first time. They combined to pitch the first four innings of a 14-3 win over the Cardinals.

Peralta’s outing coincided with Carlos Mendoza announcing that he will be the Opening Day starter. Peralta lived up to the billing, as he fired three perfect innings. He struck out three, including the last two batters he faced.

Peralta threw just 29 pitches. His second inning was especially efficient, only needing six to get through the middle of the Cardinals’ order.

Peralta’s pitch mix was pretty much in line with what he offered during his sublime 2025 season for the Brewers. The only slight difference was a marginal uptick in his slider. He threw it five times (17%), which would be 7% more than last year, when it was the least common of his four pitches. At 29 pitches, though — and in his spring debut, no less — it’s too small of a sample to make anything big out of.

Peralta generated six whiffs, five of which came from his four-seam fastball. That was despite averaging only 92.9 mph on the pitch, down from last year’s average of 94.8.

“The life on the fastball, even though it’s 93, 94 on the radar gun, it just plays up,” Mendoza told reporters after the game. ”

Peralta’s fastball was his “worst” pitch in 2025. The whiff rate against it was 22.8%, the lowest mark he’s had for that pitch in his career. Opposing batters hit .209 with a .381 slugging percentage against his fastball — still very good numbers, but not as dominant as his secondary offerings. He consistently throws his fastball more than half the time each season, although less often than he did in the first three years of his career.

Peralta’s first strikeout in a Mets uniform came on a 93.3 mph fastball above the zone, on the inner part of the plate.

He recorded his second strikeout with a 3-2 changeup in the zone. His change was his second-most frequent offering last year at 21.2%. It generated a 35.2% whiff rate, the second-best of his pitches behind only his slider, which had a whopping 52.8% despite being his most seldom-used offering.

Peralta’s final strikeout – and final batter of his outing — ended in a fastball for a called strike at the knees. The call was upheld via the new ABS system.

After Peralta put the final sparkles on a clean audition tape, it was Williams time.

Williams is the Mets’ Edwin Díaz replacement. A lot of eyes will be on him — mainly to see which version of him the Mets are getting. He posted a 4.79 ERA in 67 games for the Yankees last year, after maintaining a 1.83 ERA over six seasons with the Brewers.

The first pitch he threw was promptly hit for a home run.

JJ Wetherholt crushed a cutter that was up in the zone, but over the middle of the plate.

“I babied it,” Williams said. “Just trying to throw it over the plate. He wasn’t giving me strike one.”

From there, Williams retired the side on eight pitches. He got two outs with his changeup and one with his cutter — which he kept down and in on his second try.

Williams’ cutter has been almost nonexistent throughout his career. He threw just two all of last season. In seven seasons, he’s totaled 49 of them.

He threw two in a nine-pitch span in his first spring outing.

The only real takeaway from Williams’ outing is that he’s toying around with his arsenal, which is what spring training is for. The first one got hit, but he breezed through the rest of the inning.

“He was good. Only that first pitch, the cutter that didn’t cut much. It’s a pitch he’s working on,” Mendoza said. “I thought the fastball was good. He threw a couple of good sliders, which is another pitch he’s working on. Good inning of work for him.”

The post Peralta Perfect, Williams Tests Cutter in Spring Debuts appeared first on Metsmerized Online.