Building an all-Subway Series roster, rotation as Mets and Yankees face off: Aaron Judge, Pete Alonso and more

The Yankees host the Mets at Yankee Stadium beginning Friday night

By Mike Axisa

May 15, 2025 at 10:00 am ET • 9 min read

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The first leg of the 2025 Subway Series begins Friday when the New York Yankees host the crosstown rival New York Mets for the first of three games at Yankee Stadium. They'll play three games at Citi Field in July. The Mets have dominated the Subway Series of late: they won all four games against the Yankees last year and are 12-6 in 18 games against their big brother since 2021.

This weekend is MLB's (first annual?) Rivalry Weekend. The league is highlighting location-based rivalries rather than actual rivalries (Yankees/Red Sox, Dodgers/Giants, etc.), so it's a good idea with maybe not the best execution. Yankees/Mets will have the juice though. It is Juan Soto's first series back in the Bronx, plus these are two first-place teams with rabid fan bases.

"I think the Subway Series is just another series where we have to go out there and try to win," Soto said about returning to Yankee Stadium earlier this week (via NJ.com). "We have to keep moving forward, forget about who we're going to face, and just try to win the series. Because in the end, that's what we're here for."

Here are the details for this weekend's three-game series at Yankee Stadium. Select games can be streamed regionally on fubo (try for free).

Date	Start time	Starting pitchers	TV
Fri., May 16	7:05 p.m. ET	LHP Carlos Rodón (4-3, 3.29) vs. RHP Tylor Megill (3-3, 3.10)	YES, WPIX
Sat., May 17	1:05 p.m. ET	RHP Clarke Schmidt (1-1, 4.73) vs. RHP Griffin Canning (5-1, 2.36)	YES, SNY
Sun., May 18	7:10 p.m. ET	LHP Max Fried (6-0, 1.11) vs. LHP David Peterson (2-2, 3.05)	ESPN

The only former Met on the Yankees' roster is seldom-used utility man Pablo Reyes. The Mets have Soto, Yankees-closer-turned-Mets-starter Clay Holmes, and manager Carlos Mendoza. Mendoza was a longtime minor-league player and coach in the Yankees' organization, and manager Aaron Boone's bench coach from 2020-23. Mendoza is 4-0 head-to-head against Boone.

With the Subway Series set to begin Friday, let's compare the Yankees and Mets position-by-position using their rosters as they sit right now, heading into the series. Here is the tale of the tape for New York baseball.

Catcher: Austin Wells

Francisco Alvarez returned from his hamate injury late last month and the Mets got nice work from backup catcher (and former Yankees prospect) Luis Torrens during his absence, but Wells gets the nod behind the plate. He is second among all catchers in home runs (eight) and extra-base hits (16), he's struck out only five times in his last 44 plate appearances, and he ranks as the league's best pitch-framer per Statcast. Wells finished third in the AL Rookie of the Year voting last season and has continued his march toward becoming one of the game's top all-around catchers.

First base: Pete Alonso

Give the Yankees a truth serum and I'm certain they'd say that, while they expected Paul Goldschmidt to have a bounceback season, they didn't expect him to be this good. He'll take a .346/.395/.506 slash line into the Subway Series. As good as Goldschmidt has been, Alonso is the easy call at first base. A quarter of the way into the season, he boasts a .311/.421/.584 line with nine home runs and a career-best 13.8% walk rate. Alonso has been the most productive non-Freddie Freeman first baseman in baseball this year. Goldschmidt isn't too far behind him, but Alonso's the pick at the cold corner.

Second base: Luisangel Acuña

It is Acuña almost by default with Jazz Chisholm Jr. injured, not that Acuña hasn't played well. His .271/.331/.327 line is acceptable at the bottom of the lineup, and he brings strong defense and baserunning to the table too. The Yankees have rotated DJ LeMahieu, Oswald Peraza, and Jorbit Vivas through second base since Chisholm got hurt two weeks ago and they've collectively done a great job of making Yankees fans miss Chisholm.

Shortstop: Francisco Lindor

Anthony Volpe seems to be having his long-awaited breakout season, or at least as "long-awaited" as a breakout season can be for a 24-year-old in his third big-league season. Still, Volpe is no Lindor, who is one of the game's best all-around players and has a magnetic personality. He is everything a team could possibly want in a franchise player. Lindor is playing at an MVP level again -- .297/.364/.491 with nine home runs and six stolen bases, plus strong defense -- and would be the starting shortstop on every combined team other than Mets/Royals.

Third base: Mark Vientos

Vientos has spent more time at DH lately, though he leads the two New York teams with 35 starts at the hot corner, so we'll roll with him here. His .245/.313/.401 line is down quite a bit from last year's .266/.322/.516 but is at least trending in the right direction the last few weeks. Oswaldo Cabrera has been on the heavy side of the Yankees' third base platoon with Peraza and he authored a .243/.333/.308 line before his gruesome ankle injury earlier this week. Cabrera has Vientos beat in WAR this season thanks to his glove (0.4 to 0.3), but I'm a bat-first guy, so Vientos would be my pick even if Cabrera were healthy.

Left field: Jasson Domínguez

Using 2025 numbers, you could make a pretty great left field platoon out of Domínguez (.305/.383/.512 vs. RHP) and Brandon Nimmo (.306/.333/.583 vs. LHP). Since we're picking one and only one player at each position in this exercise, we're going with Domínguez, who is outdoing Nimmo both offensively (.761 OPS vs. .714 OBP) and overall (0.7 WAR vs. 0.5 WAR). Plus El Marciano -- The Martian -- is a pretty cool nickname at a time when most baseball nicknames are lacking. A cool nickname is a good tiebreaker.

Center field: Trent Grisham

Seven weeks into 2025, Grisham hasn't just been the best center fielder in New York, he's been one of the best center fielders in baseball period. The other guy the Yankees got in the Soto trade is hitting .283/.367/.628 and ranks third in the American League with 12 homers, and he's done that while playing solid defense. Grisham's play has pushed Cody Bellinger into more of a "tenth man" role, where he moves around to different positions each day. The Mets have had to lean on Tyrone Taylor in center field since Jose Siri broke his leg last month. As a group, Mets' center fielders are hitting .215/.272/.349 with 0.4 WAR. Yeah, Grisham's the pick.

Right field: Aaron Judge

Soto is one of the few players who can make this position a discussion, but Judge would still be the pick here even if Soto was having a typical Soto season, which he is not thus far. He hasn't been bad by any means. You know you're pretty good when you're hitting .255/.380/.465 with eight homers and folks are wondering when you're going to get hot. It's just that Judge is on another planet right now. He'll go into the Subway Series leading baseball in batting average (.412), on-base percentage (.497), slugging percentage (.782), home runs (15), RBI (41), WAR (4.0), and a bunch of other stuff.

Designated hitter: Ben Rice

Giancarlo Stanton's injury has been a blessing in disguise for the Yankees. Stanton hit 27 home runs in only 114 games last year, and he was a monster in the postseason, but he has a .291 on-base percentage and 105 OPS+ over the last three seasons. He has yet to play this year due to elbow trouble. Stanton's injury opened the door for Rice and he's been terrific: .254/.355/.545 with nine homers. The Mets have rotated players through the DH spot since Jesse Winker suffered an oblique injury two weeks ago. Their DH spot has combined for a .242/.331/.418 line. We're talking about a bat-only position here, so Rice is an easy pick.

The Mets boast the better infield, the Yankees the better outfield and catcher (and DH). Now that we have the nine positions sorted out, let's build a starting lineup, shall we? The combined Mets/Yankees Subway Series lineup comes together pretty easily, I think:

SS Francisco Lindor, SHB
RF Aaron Judge, RHB
1B Pete Alonso, RHB
CF Trent Grisham, LHB
3B Mark Vientos, RHB
DH Ben Rice, LHB
LF Jasson Domínguez, SHB
C Austin Wells, LHB
2B Luisangel Acuña, RHB

Good left/right balance, power throughout, and some speed. Pretty good lineup, that is. Plugging each player's 2025 numbers into the Baseball Musings Lineup Analysis tool tells us that batting order would average 6.46 runs per game, or 1,047 runs across a 162-game season. The MLB average is 4.36 runs per game this year and the Modern Era record is 1,067 runs by the 1931 Yankees. Build the best possible lineup using players from two of the best teams in the league gives you a historic offense. News at 11.

Starting pitchers: Mets

Because we're comparing the teams the Mets and Yankees will put on the field weekend rather than their ideal "everyone's healthy" roster, we're going to focus on the starters scheduled to pitch these next three games rather than the rotations as a whole. Here are the starting pitching matchups in case you need a reminder:

Friday: Carlos Rodón vs. Tylor Megill
Saturday: Clarke Schmidt vs. Griffin Canning
Sunday: Max Fried vs. David Peterson

For all intents and purposes, that is the Yankees' top three starters against the Mets' bottom three starters. Clay Holmes and Kodai Senga started the last two games for the Mets and will miss this weekend. The Yankees have had a ton of off-days lately (and more coming up) and are essentially rolling with a four-man rotation at the moment. It's those three guys plus rookie Will Warren.

Fried has been outstanding in his first season with the Yankees -- his 1.11 ERA is the lowest ever through a pitcher's first nine starts with the Yankees -- and is the best starter between the two teams. Rodón has been very good more often than not this year and Schmidt is just now rounding into form after missing the start of the season with a shoulder issue. With Gerrit Cole and Luis Gil injured, this the best the Yankees have to offer at the moment.

The Mets, meanwhile, have gotten outstanding work from Megill, Peterson, and especially Canning. The Mets have Canning throwing more sliders than fastballs these days and not many starters get through a full 30-start workload in one piece doing that, but they just need him to hold down a rotation spot until Sean Manaea and Frankie Montas return later this summer. The Amazin's bottom three starters have been as good as most teams' top three starters this year.

Bullpen: Mets

This really is a toss up. Fernando Cruz and Luke Weaver have been the two best relievers between the two teams this season, but the Mets have showcased greater depth, and frankly have just done a better job in high-leverage situations. The Yankees have lost six games when taking a lead into the seventh inning, tied for the most in baseball. That is rough.

Devin Williams has been better the last few times out, but he still isn't dominating like vintage Williams, and his season to date has been pretty awful (8.36 ERA and minus-0.65 win probability added). If Williams was pitching like 2020-24 Williams, then I would probably go with the Yankees here. I would take Cruz and Weaver in the late innings over any two Mets relievers, but the Mets' bullpen is greater as a whole. I'll take them heading into this weekend's Subway Series.

The Yankees (25-18 and plus-81 run differential) and Mets (28-16 and plus-65 run differential) sit atop their divisions and are trying to hold off rival teams while dealing with pitching injuries. These are important games for both teams. Add in the crosstown rivalry and Soto's return to the Bronx, and it will be an electric atmosphere at Yankee Stadium these next three nights. It always is when the Mets and Yankees meet. Want a prediction? I'll say the Mets win two of three with Judge outperforming Soto while the rest of the Mets outperform the rest of the Yankees.