The Mets have at least talked to one of the top arms on the open market.
They met with Framber Valdez, noti.group’s Jon Heyman reported.
The Giants and Orioles also met with the lefty, per Heyman.
Valdez spent the first eight seasons of his career with the Astros, and went 13-11 record with a 3.37 ERA last year.
In 17 career postseason appearances, with all but one coming as a starting pitcher, Valdez owns a 4.34 ERA.
The Mets and president David Stearns prefer not to give long, lucrative deals to pitchers given the injury risk, per Heyman, but have made exceptions for top talent in the past — they offered $325 million to Yoshinobu Yamamoto, The Post previously reported.
Yamomoto ultimately signed with the Dodgers for the same amount.
The Mets’ starting pitching struggles were central to their collapse out of the playoff picture last year.
Their owned a 4.13 ERA last year, which ranked 18th after a blazing start.
Sean Manaea regressed, Frankie Montas was a disaster before getting hurt, David Peterson faded down the stretch, Kodai Senga struggled badly after returning from injury and Clay Holmes didn’t pitch deep into games.
It was the Mets rookies — Nolan McClean, Brandon Sproat and Jonah Tong — that provided any quality as starters.
That has left a glaring hole in the rotation for Stearns to fill.
Valdez would provide a proven option.
The Mets have already seen Pete Alonso (Orioles), Edwin Diaz (Dodgers), Brandon Nimmo (Rangers) and Jeff McNeil (A’s) sign with other teams or traded away as Stearns tries for a complete makeover to their core.
[Notigroup Newsroom in collaboration with other media outlets, with information from the following sources]
