Every successful baseball team has some pleasant surprises. Both the Mets and Yankees, who faced off in the rubber match in the Bronx edition of this season’s Subway Series on Sunday night, have one that is making serious contributions.

When the Mets recalled Brett Baty from the minors on May 5, one couldn’t really be sure what they were getting. A highly-regarded first-round pick with a full toolbox, Baty had received plenty of chances to hit at the big-league level and had not delivered. He made the club out of spring training but couldn’t hold the spot with a meager .204 batting average and was sent down on April 24.

When the Yankees brought DJ LeMahieu off the injured list on May 13, one couldn’t be sure of what he’d look like. After injuries limited him to 67 games last season, he suffered a calf injury early in spring training. And even in 2023 when he hit .247, he didn’t look like the guy who had won two batting titles.

But Baty and LeMahieu have both excelled since rejoining their respective big-league clubs.

LeMahieu made his third start of the season at second base on Sunday, coming off an excellent performance in the Yankees' 3-2 loss on Saturday. He went 2-for-4 with a home run and had hard-hit balls (over 96 mph off the bat) in all four turns at the plate. LeMahieu also made a pair of excellent rangy defensive plays, a diving backhand of a Francisco Lindor shot up the middle for a throw out and diving stop of a Baty grounder to the hole between second and first, that went for an infield single when he couldn’t come up with the throw.

“I’m in a good spot physically, feeling better than I have in some time, and feeling like myself again,” LeMahieu said. “I also had a really good rehab and started hitting the ball hard there. Now I just have to keep it going.

“I really like contributing and I missed that."

“As good a player as he's been in his career, and to have the injuries and the setbacks that he's had off and on over the last few years . . . and to [now] be able to go out there and play in these high-stakes games, he likes that,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said. “It's good to see him [again] because he loves this environment. He loves playing in these games. And so the fact that he's physically feeling the way he is and then looking to part, too, is exciting.”

With Jazz Chisholm Jr. injured, he’s been the choice to start at second base, the position he’d always played until injuries limited his range. In 2023 and 2024, he played just nine times there in 203 games.

“Second base feels natural because it's where I always had played,” LeMahieu said.

Baty has flashed leather and lumber since returning to the Mets. Entering play Sunday, when he again started at third base, he was batting .292 with four home runs and seven RBIs in the nine games since the May 5 call-up.

On Saturday, Baty made three bear-handed plays on slow rollers to get outs at first base. Baty was a third baseman initially and was retrained to be a second baseman before this season. He made 15 starts at second base before he got sent down.

Mets manager Carlos Mendoza believes the middle infield work has paid dividends at third base.

“He's rid of the bad first step, [improved] the quickness of it,” Mendoza said. “The way he made those plays, he made it look easy and they were not as easy as he made it look because of the jump he got on them. The way he's attacking the baseball, having the awareness of who's running, there's a lot to life on his game right now.”

“The tools, the skills, were there, it was just a matter of I didn't see it at this level. But from the beginning, we were high on him. We know he's capable of hitting the ball out of the ballpark, capable of using the whole field and . . . the way he's playing defense [has been exciting to see].”

Righty reliever Scott Effross, coming back from a hamstring injury, was reinstated from the 15-day IL and was optioned to Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre. . . Righthander JT Brubaker, out since suffering broken ribs from a batted ball in a spring training game, began a minor-league rehab assignment on Sunday with High-A Hudson Valley and threw 37 pitches in three scoreless innings. . . . Breanna Stewart of the 2024 WNBA champion Liberty threw out the ceremonial first pitch.

Mendoza opted for Jeff McNeil in centerfield over Tyrone Taylor on Sunday night because Taylor had experienced cramping late in Saturday’s game. The move was more precautionary as Taylor said he was feeling fine on Sunday.