While it’s safe to say that the weakest part of this Mets team is the bullpen, that is not to say that there haven’t been several bright spots in it this year. It started with the emergence of Jeurys Familia as one of the best stoppers in all of baseball in the absence of Jenrry Mejia. But it didn’t stop there.
On December 11th, 2014, the Mets selected Sean Gilmartin in the Rule 5 draft from the Minnesota Twins. Of course, acquiring a player this way comes with some strings attached. If the Mets chose not to have Gilmartin on their Opening Day roster, he would be sent back to the Twins. However, the lefty made the cut and didn’t look back from there.
As it stands today, Gilmartin has pitched 44.0 innings for the Mets and pitched to a 2.25 ERA with 43 strikeouts and only 14 walks. Especially as of late, Gilmartin has proved himself a viable option out of the pen for Terry Collins. He has even shown the ability to throw multiple innings at a time in extra inning games or when the starting pitcher gets knocked out early. He has thrown more than one inning in each of his last five appearances.
“My thought process daily was, especially in Spring Training, ‘Don’t give them a reason to send me back,” Gilmartin told Anthony DiComo of MLB.com. “You want to stick. You want to make an impact with the team that took you.”
Gilmartin is one of only six 2015 Rule 5 picks who stayed with the team that chose them for the entire season.
