Drew Gilbert’s Strong Start Could Catch Mets’ Attention

Drew Gilbert is getting healthy and producing at the right time.

The 24-year-old outfield prospect missed three months last year while dealing with a right hamstring strain, and in the 56 games he did play at Triple-A Syracuse, he hit .215/.313/.393 with 10 home runs in 214 at-bats. He struggled in the Arizona Fall League as well, going 15-for-72 (.208) with four homers.

Things, however, have turned around in the early part of this season for Gilbert. In 46 plate appearances in the minors, he’s hitting .359/.435/.590. He played six games while rehabbing at Low-A St. Lucie before going 5-for-15 with a double at Syracuse. He hit two home runs for St. Lucie, and here is a video of him making an excellent throw to nail a runner at the plate.

Meanwhile, in Queens, Tyrone Taylor is hitting .188/.224/.266 with no home runs. Jose Siri went 1-for-20 before he got hurt, and he will be out for another couple of months with a fractured tibia. The Mets could certainly use some offensive production, and overall reinforcements, in center field.

Jeff McNeil, who is returning Friday, played some center during his rehab, but the 33-year-old has spent just 16 innings there in his big league career. New York could try Luisangel Acuña, who played 31 games in center at Triple-A Syracuse last year, but he’s yet to appear there at the major league level. There is also Brandon Nimmo, a long-time center fielder who made 22 starts at the position in 2024.

Gilbert was a first-round pick (No. 28 overall) of the Houston Astros in 2022 out of the University of Tennessee who came to the Mets in the 2023 trade deadline trade of Justin Verlander. He was a top 100 prospect before sustaining his injuries who hit 18 home runs and posted an .868 OPS in 2023 while playing for three teams across two levels, reaching as high as Double-A.

MMO ranked him as the No. 9 prospect in the organization heading into this season.

A 2025 Baseball Savant scouting report said that Gilbert was “defined by his kinetic play in the field before last season, but many who saw him thought he looked like he was tamping down on the energy coming off the hamstring. He still managed the strike zone fairly well but struggled making consistent contact against sliders and changeups.”

He may factor into the Mets’ plans this year, so his progress bears watching over the coming weeks and months.

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