Anthony Rieber: The time is now for Mets to promote Ronny Mauricio
Ronny Mauricio of the New York Mets runs off the field after the eighth inning against the Chicago Cubs at Citi Field on June 25, 2026. Credit: Jim McIsaac
Brett Baty started at second base for the Mets on Sunday at Citi Field to give Marcus Semien a day off against a righthanded starter.
Nothing against Semien, but the bench should be his position for the rest of the season. And not to get Baty’s bat in the lineup.
The Mets need to call up Ronny Mauricio and make him the everyday second baseman for the final six weeks of the season.
Mauricio has been bouncing around the infield for Triple-A Syracuse. A natural shortstop, the 25-year-old started at third base on Saturday, when he hit his 14th home run, a 425-foot blast to centerfield, and at short on Sunday.
When the switch-hitter connects, the ball jumps off his bat. That’s a rare and undeniable skill. The only question left for Mauricio to answer is whether he can hit with enough frequency to be an everyday player in the majors.
The jury is in on Mauricio as a Triple-A player. He’s very good at that level. The Mets need to decipher what, if anything, Mauricio can give them as they turn the page to 2027.
Semien, 35, is batting .209. You know what he is. A declining offensive player with two years and $46 million left on his contract. The Mets are going to have to eat that $46 million in the offseason, whenever the real offseason begins after the expected lockout.
There’s zero value to giving Semien more at-bats down the stretch. There’s zero value to having Mauricio continue to face Triple-A pitching. There’s zero value to waiting until the rosters expand on Sept. 1. Mauricio could be at Citi Field in time for Monday night’s game against the Padres.
“Ronnie's obviously on [the 40-man] roster,” interim manager Andy Green said on Sunday. “Somebody that we're paying attention to consistently. Know what kind of pop he has. Know how well he's performed at the Triple-A level throughout his career. At this moment, we're going with the guys we got, but we're watching and seeing what he's doing.”
The Mets have a Kiddie Corps of Carson Benge and A.J. Ewing, both of whom bring hope for now and the future. The past Kiddie Corps of Baty, Mark Vientos and Francisco Alvarez are looking a little long in the tooth, and it would be a surprise if any one of them turns into a perennial All-Star.
Mauricio is a tweener; not as young as Benge and Ewing, not as tested (and found lacking) in the majors as Baty, Vientos and Alvarez.
Mauricio has been sniffing the major leagues for so long that it seems as if he’s in his 30s. He’s not. He debuted in 2023 and has appeared in 104 big-league games without ever getting a true shot to be a regular.
That’s OK on a contending team — young players have to earn it — but the Mets went into Sunday 11 games back in the wild-card race.
After Sunday’s 4-3 win over the Nationals, the Mets have won three in a row and nine of 12. It would take a miracle for the Mets to be a contending team in 2026. Unfortunately, it got late early in Flushing, the recent surge notwithstanding.
Mauricio has appeared in 30 games at second base in the majors and has made two errors. His .984 fielding percentage is his best at any position in the bigs. Small sample size caveat, of course.
Would Mauricio be as smooth as the two-time Gold Glove award winner Semien at second base? Not likely. Would he hit better than .209? He might not. He needs to learn to control the strike zone, to handle off-speed pitches, to put good at-bats back-to-back-to-back.
He might never master those crucial skills. But it’s time for the Mets to find out if he can.
In sporadic action, Mauricio’s career big-league numbers are a batting average of .226 and an OPS of .623 with nine home runs and 11 stolen bases. Power and speed are a tantalizing combination.
Mets fans have seen glimpses of Mauricio’s offensive potential. His first big-league hit on Sept. 1, 2023, was a 117.3-mph double, which at the time was the hardest-hit ball by a Met in more than two years and the hardest-hit first hit by a player in the Statcast era (beginning in 2015). His first home run 11 days later went 440 feet.
The Mets might have taken a longer look in 2024, but Mauricio tore his ACL playing winter ball and missed the season. He didn’t return to the majors until June 3, 2025. This year, Mauricio broke his left thumb sliding into second base in Anaheim on May 2 and missed six weeks.
In the minors, Mauricio has had days like Aug. 8, when he went 4-for-4 with two doubles, a home run, five RBIs and a walk for Syracuse. Considering the state of the Mets — playing for tomorrow — maybe they should have called him up the next day.
They didn’t. Today will do just fine.
Anthony Rieber covers sports media and business and professional sports (you know, games and trades and things). He has worked at Newsday since Aug. 31, 1998, and has been in his current position since Jan. 1, 2026.
