In the wee hours of the morning, the Mets reportedly completed a trade sending right-handed reliever Huascar Brazobán to the Chicago White Sox for a pair of minor league pitchers, Gabe Davis and Zach Franklin.
Brazobán’s path to the majors was not a traditional one, as he was drafted in 2011 and toiled in the minor leagues for nine years, with a four year detour to the International League, before finally making the bigs in 2023 as a member of the Miami Marlins. As part of their trade deadline in 2024, the Mets sent Wilfredo Lara to the Fish for Brazobán’s services. Although 2024 was not a great season for Brazobán, 2025 and 2026 have both been highly effective. 2026 has been easily his best year in professional baseball thus far, putting up a 162 ERA+, a 2.56 ERA, and a 2.13 K/BB ratio.
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The knock on Brazobán, and the likely reason the Mets moved a reliever with three years of team control, is his age. Brazobán is entering his age 37 season in 2027, and with reliever volatility and the general aging curve of baseball, each subsequent season from now on seemed to be more of a roll of a the dice than usual.
The return includes Gabe Davis, Chicago’s fifth round draft pick in 2025, currently ranked as the White Sox 18th best prospect via MLB Pipeline and 20th per Baseball America. Davis is a tall (6’9″) drink of water who couldn’t harness his raw stuff at Oklahoma State. Davis dominated High-A ball in eight starts, but struggled since his Double-A call up. Here is what our friends at South Side Sox had to say about Davis:
…The right-hander’s stuff is extremely interesting. His fastball sits 94–97 mph and touches 100, thrown from a massive frame that naturally creates steep plane. The velocity doesn’t always overpower hitters the way the number on the scoreboard suggests, but the pitch still flashes plenty of life. Davis’ best weapon is a tight, upper-80s power slider. A pitch that can reach 92 mph and serves as a legitimate wipeout offering when he’s synced up. He can morph it into a harder cutter and mixes in an occasional mid-80s changeup with promising fade, though the change remains his least reliable pitch.
Zach Franklin, unlisted in either MLB Pipeline or Baseball America’s Sox prospect lists, is a relief pitcher drafted out of the University of Missouri in 2023. Per South Side Sox, Franklin has short arm action that builds in some deception and throws a split-change, a breaking pitch that acts like a slider, and a sinker and four-seam fastball. Minor league reliever data is always a little tough to come by/parse, but it looks like Franklin struggled a bit in his promotion to Triple-A this season, but continues to strike out guys at a high rate and not walk too many.
