Mets' Kodai Senga 'pretty much done' for regular season after injuring calf
Mets starting pitcher Kodai Senga walks to the dugout after the top of the fifth inning of an MLB game against Atlanta at Citi Field on Friday. Credit: Kathleen Malone-Van Dyke
Kodai Senga’s season may well have ended mere innings after it began.
He suffered a “high-grade” strain of his left calf in his season debut Friday, manager Carlos Mendoza said, which means he is “pretty much done” for the regular season.
Mendoza left open the possibility that Senga could return for the playoffs. But that will depend on how he recovers and how the team fares in the standings.
So the Mets will have to navigate the final two months of the season the same way they handled the first four: lacking their best pitcher.
“It’s a huge blow,” Mendoza said Saturday after Senga received an MRI and was put on the injured list. “But at the same time, we got to this point without him. It sucks for him, for all of us. The way I see it is: We’ve been through a lot. And if we get to see him pitch again this year, that means we’re in a good spot. Hopefully that’s the case.”
Brandon Nimmo said: “We hurt for him. He’s put a lot of hard work in to get back to this point, and then for that first start out to be hurt again and miss the rest of the season, it’s not a good feeling.”
Further complicating Senga’s potential comeback is the nature of calf issues.
“Those are tricky,” Mendoza said. “We could be looking at eight, 10 weeks before he’s a big-league pitcher [able to throw about] 85 pitches. But yeah. It’s hard to predict what we’re dealing with. But it’s a high grade.”
After suffering a strained shoulder in February and getting set back by a triceps injury in May, Senga finally got on the mound for the Mets on Friday against Atlanta. And he very much looked like the guy who earned down-ballot Cy Young Award and Rookie of the Year votes in 2023, striking out nine and allowing two hits and two runs in 5 1⁄3 innings.
On that last out, though, he scrambled to get out of the way of a pop-up caught by first baseman Pete Alonso. Senga went down in a heap between the mound and first-base line, grabbing his lower leg and in obvious pain. He was slow to get up and limped off the field.
Now he is facing the reality that that might be his only appearance of 2024.
“It’s hard for him,” Mendoza said. “We’re feeling it for him because he’s been through a lot the whole year. He goes out there and has a game like that . . . For him to go down that way sucks.”
In Senga’s absence, the Mets at least for now will abandon their plan to use a six-man rotation, according to Mendoza. So they don’t need another starter to replace him and can roll with their current group: Tylor Megill, David Peterson, Jose Quintana, Sean Manaea and Luis Severino.
Still, rotation help before Tuesday’s trade deadline suddenly is more of a need now than it was previously. The Mets thought they were adding a front-of-the-rotation arm for the playoff push, and now they aren’t.
“I trust David [Stearns, the Mets' president of baseball operations] and the whole group there,” Mendoza said. “I know they’re going to do what’s best for this team not only for this year but for the future. I like what we got. I feel good with what we have, not only in this room but down on the farm.”
Nimmo said: “He really is a true ace when he’s healthy and he’s out there . . . It’s really hard to replace aces like that.”
Tim Healey is the Mets beat writer for Newsday. Born on Long Island and raised in Connecticut, Tim has previously worked for the South Florida Sun Sentinel, the Boston Globe and MLB.com. He is also the author of “Hometown Hardball,” a book about minor league baseball in the northeast.
