Mets' pitching staff starting to show some cracks
Mets pitcher Kodai Senga on the mound in the fourth inning against the Arizona Diamondbacks at Citi Field on Thursday. Credit: Newsday/Thomas A. Ferrara
During his truncated time on the Citi Field mound on Thursday afternoon, Kodai Senga looked like a man in search of something.
Senga mimicked his own throwing motion more than once. After a third-inning visit from pitching coach Jeremy Hefner, Senga crouched behind the mound to collect himself.
Senga threw 87 pitches against the Diamondbacks. Many of them were nasty. A surprising number of them were not. He lasted only four innings and allowed only one run but was the losing pitcher in the Mets’ 4-2 defeat.
Cause for concern? Not when it comes to Senga’s baseball health.
It turns out he has been battling the same stomach bug that has been going around the Mets’ clubhouse and felled Brandon Nimmo for two games this week after he had a career-best nine-RBI game in Washington.
Asked how he felt, Senga, through an interpreter, said: “Not great.”
Carlos Mendoza revealed after the game that Senga’s start was in doubt until Wednesday and that he needed an IV to combat the symptoms.
Said Senga: “I made the decision to go out there and pitch. So, as a starter, I wanted to go six-plus innings.”
He didn’t. Part of the reason: the third and fourth innings. Senga pitched to the minimum six batters in the first two innings but faced 13 batters combined in the third and fourth.
The Mets are in an odd space right now: They have an MLB-best 2.68 ERA and are 21-11, but their starters aren’t going deep enough in games and their bullpen has been beset by recent injuries.
“Ideally, you want your starting pitcher to go deep in games,” Mendoza said. “You’re asking four or five innings out of your bullpen every day. That’s hard to do.”
Sean Manaea, Frankie Montas and Paul Blackburn have yet to throw a pitch in 2025. Lefthanded relievers A.J. Minter and Danny Young are facing the possibility of season-ending surgeries.
Cracks have started to show in the last week. After a seven-game winning streak, the Mets split a four-game series in Washington and lost two of three at home to Arizona.
Ryne Stanek, twice filling in for the seemingly oft-resting Edwin Diaz as closer, blew two saves and lost two games in Washington. On Wednesday, Stanek suffered his third straight blown save and third straight loss after entering a bullpen game with a 1-0 lead in the seventh and allowing two runs.
The injuries to Minter and Young have left the Mets with a revolving door of relievers. Brandon Waddell and Chris Devenski, who were called up and pitched on Wednesday, barely had time to get adjusted to their Citi Field lockers before they were sent out on Thursday.
They were replaced by Genesis Cabrera, who was charged with a run in his Mets debut, and Ty Adcock, who faced four batters and retired only one of them in the ninth. Luckily for Adcock, all he needed was the one; he entered with two outs and no one on and left the bases loaded.
Adcock was the only one of the Mets’ five pitchers who did not give up a run. Juan Soto hit his first two Citi Field home runs as a Met, but his teammates offered little help.
Senga struck out six, but his three walks included two on four pitches. What was striking was that none of those eight pitches — to No. 2 hitter Geraldo Perdomo in the third and No. 8 hitter Tim Tawa in the fourth — were particularly close.
“I didn’t have great feel overall today,” Senga said. “The good pitches were good but the poor ones were significantly poor.”
Senga recovered after walking Perdomo to load the bases in a scoreless game and struck out Pavin Smith on three pitches to end the third. Nasty.
Likewise, after issuing the four-pitch free pass to Tawa to again load the bases with one out in the fourth, Senga got Jose Herrera on a short pop to third. Senga escaped when Corbin Carroll pinned Nimmo to the leftfield fence for what wouldn’t have been a grand slam but certainly would have been at least a two-run double without Nimmo’s perfectly timed leaping grab.
The Mets’ mound depth, which has been a strength, is going to be further tested this weekend in St. Louis after they used a total of nine pitchers in the past two games. On Thursday, Max Kranick went 2 2⁄3 innings and Reed Garrett threw 1 2⁄3. Each gave up a solo home run.
The Mets, who are in a stretch of 13 games in a row and 26 games in 27 days, need a spot starter for Sunday in St. Louis. So there may be some more roster machinations to come.
At least Diaz is very well-rested. Mendoza insists the closer is healthy — in both the baseball and non-baseball sense — but Diaz has thrown only one inning since leaving an April 23 game because of a hip cramp.
“He’s fine,” Mendoza said. That’s more than Senga could say on Thursday about his obvious discomfort on the mound. No interpreter needed.
Anthony Rieber covers baseball, as well as the NFL, NBA and NHL. He has worked at Newsday since Aug. 31, 1998, and has been in his current position since July 5, 2004.
