Ryan Helsley won’t be in Queens come next season.
Helsley, whom the Mets acquired at the trade deadline last season, signed a two-year contract worth $28 million with the Orioles, noti.group’s Jon Heyman confirmed Saturday.
The deal features an opt-out after the first season, and Helsley is expected to throw the ninth inning for the Orioles.
Helsley marks the second bullpen addition for Baltimore, who reacquired Andrew Kittredge from the Cubs earlier this month after previously dealing him off to Chicago at the trade deadline.
Over the course of his seven-year career, Helsley, 31, rose to become one of the MLB’s top closers, posting a 2.96 ERA with 377 strikeouts and 105 saves across 297 appearances.
The righty racked up an MLB-best 49 saves in 2024, and he has reached the All-Star game twice in his career.
But Helsley had some of his worst moments upon joining the Mets, posting an abysmal 7.20 ERA across 20 innings while in New York.
During his short time with the Mets, Helsley was caught tipping his pitches, which could be attributed to his lack of success in Queens.
Helsley tried to adjust his glove and hand positioning to hide his pitch-tipping, and he previously told The Post that despite experiencing some problems with the Cardinals, “but nothing to this extent.”
“As a pitcher sometimes you’re gonna get got. That’s just part of the game,” Helsley said in August. “But when it’s whole innings or multiple outings in a row, and guys are looking really comfortable and taking too many good swings, especially on good pitches, or just laying off good pitches that you throw, that’s when the buzzers start going off, raising the red flags.”
Despite trying to fix his pitch-tipping issues, Helsley could not replicate his success he had while playing for the Cardinals.
[Notigroup Newsroom in collaboration with other media outlets, with information from the following sources]
