Taijuan Walker to start Tuesday night against the Yankees, Buttó optioned

Taijuan Walker, who missed yesterday’s scheduled start after leaving last Tuesday’s start against the Braves with back spasms, is now scheduled to start Tuesday night’s game against the Yankees. Jacob deGrom, who was originally scheduled to start the game, will now start “Thursday or Friday” against the Rockies, according to Buck Showalter, with Chris Bassitt starting whichever game deGrom doesn’t.

Showalter has spoken about wanting to separate deGrom and Max Scherzer in the rotation, and so this move allows one or two games to fall between his two aces’ starts. Showalter also pointed to the lack of days off, the amount of torque that deGrom utilizes to ‘create what he creates,’ the home stretch just around the corner, and the amount of innings that Bassitt has recently thrown as additional reasons to push deGrom and/or Bassitt a day. However, he maintains that “the priority is with [Walker]” for the change.

Max Scherzer starts Game 1 at Yankee Stadium in just a few hours.

In addition, according to Mike Puma, José Buttó has been optioned to Triple-A Syracuse, with the Mets calling up Connor Grey in his stead.