The Mets have sent Jeremy Rodriguez to the Developmental List, a move that comes at a curious moment for the 20-year-old infielder because his bat has actually started to show some life.
Rodriguez was one of the lower-level names the Mets picked up in the 2023 deadline shuffle, arriving from the Arizona Diamondbacks in the Tommy Pham deal. He wasn’t exactly a household prospect when he landed in the system, but he did enough early to get noticed.
At the start of the 2024 season, he was ranked as the Mets’ 12th-best prospect. Then he backed that up with a strong enough 2024 showing in St.
Lucie, hitting .282/.355/.400 over 13 games.
Since then, the production has backed up. Rodriguez hit only .202 for St.
Lucie in 2025 with one home run across nearly 500 plate appearances. He did swipe 34 bases, but he was also caught 13 times.
This season has followed a similar script: a .213/.312/.240 line, no home runs, and six steals in 11 tries.
That’s why the Developmental List move stands out. It removes Rodriguez from the active St.
Lucie roster and gives him time to work on whatever needs fixing without the day-to-day pressure of helping the team win. It’s not being framed as a last-ditch move, and at this stage it would be premature to treat it that way.
He just turned 20 and is still less than a month removed from being a teenager.
The Mets have seen this kind of reset help before. Simon Juan also spent time on the Developmental List, and the results followed.
He hit .175 in each of the first two months of the season, then returned in June and hit .234. He entered this week batting .260/.387/.400 for July.
Rodriguez may be getting the same sort of breather. In fact, his timing at the plate has picked up lately.
He’s in his best month of the year with a .278/.350/.315 slash line, and he added a 4-for-4 day on Sunday to extend a four-game hitting streak. With new draft picks and incoming prospects from deadline deals adding more bodies to the system, Rodriguez is facing more competition than ever.
For now, the Mets are giving him a chance to step back, reset, and try to get his development moving again.
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