Kodai Senga

Mets Are Somehow In Great Shape

The New York Mets did what they did all season. They followed inexplicably dropping consecutive series to the Chicago Cubs and Colorado Rockies by sweeping the Philadelphia Phillies at home. At this point, the unexpected has become the expected.

Putting the consistent inconsistency aside, we are starting to see some very positive signs emerge. More than anything, we should be focusing on that rather than the day-to-day results. After all, if certain things are working well for the Mets, the wins are going to come.

First and foremost, the rotation is starting to look like what we hoped it would be. Over his last four starts, Max Scherzer is 4-0 with a 1.08 ERA while striking out 28 and walking just four over 25 innings.

Kodai Senga has become unhittable at home. In his five Citi Field starts, he is 3-1 with a 1.20 ERA, 0.933 WHIP, 4.2 BB/9, and an incredible 11.4 K/9. As we saw with Noah Syndergaard‘s rookie year, the home/road splits will eventually translate to Senga being able to be a great pitcher on the road. It just takes a little time.

With the exception of his Coors Field start and the start against the Tampa Bay Rays, Justin Verlander has largely been good. We also see José Quintana is on a path to get back on the mound. Overall, that’s four strong starters that becomes five with Carlos Carrasco pitching 6+ innings while allowing just one earned in each of his last two starts.

Offensively, Pete Alonso is chasing 60 and looks primed to be the first non-steroid National League player to hit that mark. Francisco Álvarez has been great at the plate and may be better defensively. Brandon Nimmo is having an All-Star caliber season (again).

Francisco Lindor is playing Gold Glove defense and has been hitting for power. We also have to remember with his struggles he’s a second half hitter. Jeff McNeil has struggled, but he too is at a point in the season where he usually takes off.

Where things are really promising is the older core from last season finding their games again. Since May 9, Starling Marte is hitting .288/.342/.356 and has stolen 16 bases this season. Since May 14, Mark Canha is hitting 333/.442/.556. Eduardo Escobar has thrived in a part-time role hitting .400/.442/.700 since April 20.

That’s not to say there hasn’t been any issues. Brett Baty is struggling at the plate hitting .200/.286/.400 since May 14, but he continues to play good defense with a 1 OAA. Since May 1, Daniel Vogelbach is hitting .170/.310/.254. With both to those players struggling, it is strange to see how infrequently Mark Vientos plays.

The bullpen doesn’t go that deep, but David Robertson has been a great anchor. You can rely on Drew Smith to be a bridge. However, Brooks Raley and Adam Ottavino are too important to be as shaky as they are.

That brings us to the Mets biggest issue – Buck Showalter. He’s managing like it’s 1988, and he does bizarre things like ignoring the numbers, batting Álvarez ninth, and shoe-horning Vogelbach into the lineup. He’s just never playing Vientos at this point treating him as a strict platoon player.

However, despite Buck (yes, despite him), the Mets are 30-27 just 3.5 games back of the Atlanta Braves. The Braves are 9-13 over their last 22 games. It’s allowed the Mets to get back into the NL East race.

The Mets are also currently the second Wild Card. They’re trailing the Arizona Diamondbacks/Los Angeles Dodgers by four games, but they have a one game lead over the Pittsburgh Pirates and Miami Marlins, who are currently tied for the last Wild Card spot.

Of course, the standings right now don’t mean anything. We can just pinpoint the Mets last two seasons to illustrate that point. Rather, it just shows the Mets are in a great position to make a run. With the starting pitching emerging, their top hitters slugging, and the rest of the roster ready to break out, the Mets are poised to have a great summer, and hopefully, an even better October.

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Brandon Nimmo Quietly Having Very Good Season

There is just so much to talk about with the New York Mets at the moment. On the good, we have Pete Alonso on pace for 60 home runs, and Francisco Álvarez increasingly looks like a lock for the National League Rookie of the Year.

The rotation is all over the place. At least, we know Kodai Senga can pitch at home. Max Scherzer appears to have turned a corner, and we will just have to see from there.

Buck Showalter can’t seem to help himself. He threw Mark Vientos into a platoon for no good reason. Daniel Vogelbach looks done, and Tommy Pham may just be pushing past Vogelbach as the player to keep.

While the focus is everywhere and anywhere, we all seem to overlook just how good of a season Brandon Nimmo is having. Nimmo was out there in the last game to remind us how good and important he is:

Nimmo made yet another great defensive play in center. That play was important too because his robbing Nick Castellanos of a home run kept the game tied at zero in what would eventually be a 2-0 Mets win. Considering it was a deep dive to left for Castellanos, we probably also avoided something horrible happening.

Defensively, Nimmo has been very good for a few seasons now. This year, Nimmo has a 2 OAA which ranks sixth in the National League. Since the start of last season, Nimmo has a 6 OAA which rates him as the sixth best in the National League.

Offensively, Nimmo has a 134 wRC+. That rates as the 33rd best in all of baseball. Among center fielders, Nimmo behind just Aaron Judge and Mike Trout. Of course, Nimmo rates ahead of both of them defensively. He’s also much closer to them as an overall player as you may think.

Nimmo’s 2.0 fWAR trails Judge’s 2.9, but it is ahead of Trout’s 1.9. Like with wRC+, they are the top three center fielders in the game. Overall, Nimmo’s 2.0 fWAR is tied for 14th overall. That rates him as the fourth best NL outfielder. That should mean he’s an All-Star, but every year, he just seems to get overlooked.

In terms of bWAR, Nimmo’s 1.7 is second on the New York Mets only to Alonso. It rates him as 34th overall and 15th among outfielders. He’s eighth among center fielders and third among NL center fielders.

Overall, Nimmo is having another great year, and he should be an All-Star for the first time in his career. Of course, he may not be as people tend to overlook all the great things he does. After all, with everything going on with the Mets, we tend to have our focus in other directions even if we need to take time to acknowledge Nimmo.

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Mets Should Use Six Man Rotation

The start of the season has not been kind to the New York Mets rotation. José Quintana is out until July after his bone graft surgery. Justin Verlander started the season on the IL, and it looks like he’s ready to return after over a month on the IL.

Max Scherzer needed a day between starts, and then, he was given the bogus 10 game suspension. Carlos Carrasco struggled with the pitch clock, and then, he was shut down with right elbow inflammation,.

Kodai Senga has so far struggled getting accustomed to pitching in the Major Leagues. We don’t know if it is the quicker turn around between starts or the ball. Whatever the case is, he’s walking the ballpark, and as a result, he can’t go deep into games.

It’s possible some of the Mets pitchers issues is fatigue caused by the pitch clock. It could also be age. It may just be a mixture of everything. Whatever the case, the Mets rotation is a bit of a mess.

We saw David Peterson struggle and get sent down to Triple-A Syracuse. Tylor Megill has been uneven, but he has probably been the Mets best starter to date. Joey Lucchesi has been a pleasant surprise, and it may be difficult to lift him from the rotation with his early season success.

Looking at everything, the question is why should the Mets look to remove Megill or Lucchesi from the rotation? Sure, it would push the rotation to six starters, but at the same token, that’s what the Mets need right now.

The team is already giving Senga an extra day with Senga not being used to pitching every five days in Japan. Verlander had all of one rehab start, and that didn’t go five innings. Scherzer has needed a break, and Carrasco may return soon.

Another factor is the Mets start a stretch of games where they play six games in five days. Right there, they will need six starting pitchers. After that, they have an off day on Monday, May 8. After that, the Mets play 13 straight games before their next break. Overall, they are set to play 25 games over the next 27 days.

That schedule includes three separate road trips, and the stretch ends with a trip to Coors Field. As we know those Coors Field trips mess up with your pitching staff something fierce.

Taking it all into account, the Mets have pitchers who are still building arm strength. They are still getting accustomed to the pitch clock, and they have been battling fatigue a bit. There is a lot of games bunched together with a lot of travel.

The best way for the Mets to handle it all for the moment is to go to a six man rotation. Keep arms like Scherzer and Verlander fresh. Give Senga a better chance to acclimate to New York. Give Lucchesi and Megill a longer look in the rotation to see who can stick while Quintana and Carrasco is sidelined.

The six man rotation is what the Mets need now to ensure they make it healthy and strong to the end of the season. They need it now to let them survive a tightly packed May schedule.

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20/20 Hindsight: Mets Shaky In April

The New York Mets finished April with a 15-12 record three games behind the Atlanta Braves for first place in the National League East. Even for the Mets, there was a lot to digest:

1.  David Cone made it clear Max Scherzer wasn’t cheating, and Scherzer is owed an apology from Major League Baseball. The Mets do as well for the extra toll it took on their rotation.

2.  Jacob deGrom‘s continued injuries are sad, and we should all want the best for him. However, no one should be using that as justification for the Mets letting him go to Texas when Justin Verlander has yet to throw a pitch for the Mets.

3.  David Peterson pitched himself out of the rotation, and it’s not clear where the Mets go from here with him. He’s in Triple-A where he belongs for the time being. In the long term, the Mets need to figure out if he’s salvageable as a starter, needs to be their Trevor Williams, or perhaps their next Seth Lugo.

4.  David Robertson has more than taken over for Edwin Díaz. The issue is the rest of the bullpen continues to fluctuate between injured, ineffective, and lights out. Really, game-to-game, the Mets have no consistency down there other than Robertson.

5.  The youth movement has begun with Brett Baty, and we see Francisco Álvarez has been forcing the issue (surprisingly with his defense). At some point, the Mets are going to have to just give the DH job to Mark Vientos because he has been annihilating the baseball.

6.  Buck Showalter seems content to stick with his veterans, and if that continues in the long run, it is going to be a problem. Given how young players were the key to his success in Baltimore, it is flat out crazy to see how he hasn’t involved from the instincts which doomed him with the New York Yankees, Arizona Diamondbacks, and Texas Rangers.

7.  Pete Alonso has been nearly everything you could ask from him to start this season. In fact, he’s even back to playing good defense at first base.

8.  Brandon Nimmo has responded to signing that massive contract by arguably being the best player in baseball to start the season. This will be the first season he is an All-Star, and we should seem him get some MVP consideration should he stay healthy.

9.  It’s been an uneasy start for Francisco Lindor, but he has been phenomenal defensively. Just remember with him, May is typically the month he breaks out in a season, so we should be in for a treat.

10. The way Daniel Vogelbach has started the season he is going to give the Mets reason to follow Daniel Murphy, who is off to a hot start with the Long Island Ducks. Better yet, we may see Vientos here sooner rather than later. Really, at some point, Vogelbach has to hit for some power.

11. Whatever the Mets thinking was on Tommy Pham, it was wrong. Moreover, it was wrong to build outfield depth with players 34 and older (aside from Nimmo). That goes double when you consider the Mets have zero Major League ready outfield depth in Syracuse.

12. Jeff McNeil surprisingly got off to a very slow start. However, he has been really strong the past two weeks, and he appears poised to have another very good season for the Mets.

13. McNeil needs to be more of a table setter. The Mets going with Starling Marte batting second just isn’t working. He’s making weak contact, and he’s just not getting on base enough. McNeil isn’t a five hitter. Again, Showalter needs to stop with the deference to veterans and start looking to win games.

14. Give Eduardo Escobar all the credit in the world. He lost his job, and he responded by being an amazing teammate and mentor. While his production may not be what the Mets wanted it to be when they signed him, the signing has paid off tenfold with his leadership and clubhouse presence.

15. Increasingly, Mark Canha looks done, at least as an everyday player. There needs to be a rotation with him and Luis Guillorme playing until the Mets figure out what they want to do with Ronny Mauricio. On Mauricio, so long as Showalter is loathe to play the young players, you simply cannot call him up.

16. There is an ace somewhere inside Kodai Senga. We saw it in Japan, and we have seen glimpses of it here. However, if he is going to continue to walk the ballpark, he is going to be a borderline MLB starter. That is a huge problem for the Mets with much of their success being tied into how good or bad he performs.

17. Every year, Drew Smith seems to be performing worse than what his actual numbers are. Part of that is his walk rate is too high.

18. Tomás Nido‘s defensive metrics are surprisingly poor. Part of that may be the difficulties in catching Senga. If not, the Mets are in trouble when their defensive specialist behind the plate isn’t performing.

19. The biggest takeaway from April is the Mets appear to be a postseason team with part of that being because it is an expanded postseason format. Keep in mind, while their record now may not be awe inspiring, they are still on a 90 win pace.

20. It needs to be repeated over and over again. The Mets need to go with their younger and more productive players. If Showalter is going to stand in the way of that, the Mets need to find someone who won’t. It’s just that simple.

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Buck Showalter Needs To Remove His Inner Terry Collins

Back in 2016, after we saw Michael Conforto hit a home run in the World Series against a left-handed pitcher, Terry Collins still did not believe Conforto could hit left-handed pitching. As a result, he stuck Conforto into a platoon.

Now, Conforto was 23 years old, and despite the heroics of Yoenis Céspedes, he was probably the best outfielder on the roster. More than that, Conforto was the present and the future of the Mets. Despite that, Collins said Conforto was in a platoon because, “We’re in a situation where we’re trying to win games. This is not a time to develop players.”

It was nonsense at the time he said it, and it remains nonsense now. The goal as a manager is to win games, and it is to get the most out of your players. You win more games in the long run by developing and learning how to get more out of your players.

Fast forward to 2023, and we are seeing Buck Showalter is really no different than Collins.

At the moment, it at least seems like Brett Baty is in a third base platoon with Eduardo Escobar. Now, Escobar did hit left-handed pitching well, but then again, Baty is up here because of Escobar’s failings. Moreover, Escobar could be inserted into the lineup at the DH spot because Daniel Vogelbach cannot hit left-handed pitching at all.

However, it is Baty sitting with Showalter eschewing player development. On that topic, Showalter talked around the fact he has instituted a platoon:

Showalter can say whatever he wants, but until Baty plays against left-handed pitching regularly, he’s lying. Again, he’s sacrificing a chance to develop Baty for the sake of playing Escobar and Tommy Pham. That wont’ work for the long term, and we are not talking about future years. it can impact the Mets in August, September, and October.

This isn’t too different than what he is doing with Francisco Álvarez. All offseason and spring, the Mets said when he gets called up to the majors, he is the everyday catcher. Omar Narváez was injured early in the season leading the Mets to call up Álvarez sooner than anticipated.

Well, instead of sticking to the player development plan, Tomás Nido was elevated to starter. He has been that despite not performing offensively or defensively. In fact, in his limited duties, Álvarez has been outperforming Nido.

Sure, it makes sense to keep Nido with Kodai Senga. Asking Álvarez to catch him may be too much, too soon. That said, there is no reason why Álvarez is not regularly catching the other four Mets starters.

Perhaps, it is because Showalter subscribes to the Collins school of thought where you don’t develop young players. Getting players to improve is somehow antithetical to winning in their minds. It’s notable Collins never won anything, and despite all the Manager of the Year Awards, neither has Showalter.

Perhaps, the key to winning is to play your best players. Perhaps, the key to winning is to take your most talented players and get the most out of them. It seems to work for other teams. Perhaps, it could work for the Mets.

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José Butto Stepping Up For Mets

The New York Mets have had too many starting pitching injuries to start the season. In fact, at the moment, Kodai Senga is all that remains from their projected Opening Day rotation.

Justin Verlander and José Quintana started the year on the IL. Verlander is missing over a month, and Quintana is out until around the All-Star Break if not longer. Carlos Carrasco has an elbow injury, and there is a very real possibility he could be done for the season if not for his career.

Max Scherzer needed to have an extra day before his last start, and then he was suspended. Our good friend David Cone would show why the suspension was garbage, but nevertheless, Scherzer was suspended for 10 games.

As we know, this has pushed David Peterson and Tylor Megill into the rotation. That wasn’t a big deal as both were good starters for the Mets 101 team last season. Joey Lucchesi also had a history of being a capable Major League starter, so while the Mets may not have wanted him in the rotation, his needing to start wasn’t an issue.

The issue was with José Butto being pushed into the rotation.

Last season, Butto was thrust into the rotation, and the results were ugly. In his lone start, he last just four innings allowing seven runs to the Philadelphia Phillies. Alec Bohm really got the best of him hitting two homers. After that game, there were many who unfairly said he was a bust and would never be a Major League starter.

Fast forward to this year, and Butto was again starting games for the Mets. That is something no one wanted, but this time, Butto has fared far better than anyone would have expected.

Through two starts, Butto has pitched 9 2/3 innings allowing three earned runs. Per Baseball Savant, batters are not hitting him hard at all, and they’re having difficulty squaring the ball up on him.

Of course, it’s not all good news. Butto’s control has been poor, and that’s probably being kind. He’s walked 10 over 9 2/3 innings. That’s more than a walk per inning.

Forget about his 2.79 ERA being unsustainable with those many walks. It’s a flat out recipe for disaster. That goes double when he’s recorded only three strikeouts.

However, he’s getting away with it. There are some good reasons for it. There’s the aforementioned weak contact against him.

There’s also the 57.6% ground ball rate. Weak ground balls are easy outs for an infield with Francisco Lindor and Jeff McNeil. That’ll get you out of a lot of jams.

The other answer is Butto has faced bad teams in the Oakland Athletics and Washington Nationals. Assuredly, he’d get roughed up by better teams, but he pitched passably against the opponents he had to face.

We can dismiss what he’s done. He’s been five and fly against bad teams. That’s only part of the picture.

He’s also eaten up 9 2/3 innings which could’ve been put on the bullpen. That will help the Mets in the long run. It makes what he did far more important than many realize.

In the end, Butto looks like he still has work to do before he’s Major League ready. In the interim, he’s better than when we last saw him, and he still made a positive contribution to the team. Credit to him for stepping up.

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Mets Need More From Kodai Senga

In the opening game of the four game set against the San Francisco Giants, the New York Mets spotted a 5-0 for Kodai Senga. Of course, part of that was J.D. Davis‘ inability to play third extending Jeff McNeil‘s at-bat leading to a hit by pitch with his scoring on an Eduardo Escobar homer.

At 5-0 in the fourth, the game should have been all but over. At least, that is the case when you have a pitcher like Senga, or better put, a pitcher like we thought Senga was going to be.

Early on, Senga looked very good. His ghost fork has been unhittable. He wasn’t quite unhittable over the first four innings, but he looked in control of the game. That changed completely in the fifth.

Blake Sabol and LaMonte Wade Jr.. homered in the fifth. After that came back-to-back walks toThairo Estrada and Michael Conforto. Fortunately, Davis was up next and struck out for the second out of the inning. After an RBI single and wild pitch, it was suddenly 5-4.

That would be it for Senga. Five innings of work for a Mets bullpen that is getting increasingly more taxed by the day. So far, Senga has started four games for the Mets, and he has not gone beyond five innings twice.

The biggest issue with him has been the walks. He’s walking 14.9% of the batters he faces. That’s really beyond the limits of what is acceptable from a starting pitcher. The same goes for the 6.0 BB/9.

Even if Senga has the talent to limit the damage, he’s still taking himself out of games early with all the additional pitches. More walks is more base runners. In addition to it being more opportunities for the opposition to score, Senga is just not giving himself a chance to go deep into games.

More than that, this is when the Mets desperately need him to step up. José Quintana is gone until at least July. Justin Verlander has been out to start the season, and as of the moment, we don’t know when he will return. Carlos Carrasco has been shut down with elbow inflammation.

On top of that, Max Scherzer needed an extra day between starts. On top of that, he is being suspended for 10 days due to his being accused of using illegal substances in the game against the Los Angeles Dodgers.

That means 4/5 of the current Mets rotation is what was supposed to be the Triple-A Syracuse Mets rotation. As we know, David Peterson and Tylor Megill began the year in the rotation. Now, Jose Butto and Joey Lucchesi will be in the rotation. That is the way it will be for at least two turns through the rotation.

In many ways, that makes Senga the de facto ace. That shouldn’t be too big of a deal because that’s what he was in Japan. However, with the Mets, he hasn’t looked like that. He appears to be more of a fifth starter.

To be fair, it is just four starts into his Major League career. There is every chance he figures it out and becomes much more than a fifth starter. However, life and baseball aren’t fair. The Mets need Senga to be more than that now. They need him to accelerate his acclimation to the majors. Hopefully, he can step up and do just that because the Mets need it from him.

 

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Mets Defense Great To Start 2023 Season

Bottom first, bases loaded, two outs. Kodai Senga is on the verge of getting out of a bases loaded no out jam when Jon Berti hits a tailing line drive down the line. Instead of emptying the bases, Starling Marte races over and makes the catch to end the inning.

That right there is why the New York Mets have been off to a good start to the 2023 season. In a year which is supposed to be defined by more hits as a result of the shift ban, the Mets have been playing stellar defense. That is especially true up the middle with Francisco Lindor and Jeff McNeil.

While we know there is far too small of a sample size to adjudge defense, we see Lindor and McNeil have been making all of the plays. In terms of McNeil, per Baseball Savant, he has an 86% success rate on fielding plays. That is a 3% success added rate on plays.

That was no more true than the play he made in Miami. After a ground ball got through Pete Alonso, McNeil responded by making the sliding catch and nailing the speedy Berti at home. That play was named the inaugural Play of the Week from MLB for the 2023 season.

This should come as no surprise for McNeil. Last season, McNeil posted a 7 OAA as a second baseman. That rated him as the second best defensive second baseman in the National League.

As good as McNeil has been, Lindor has been even better. So far this season, he has an astounding 93% success rate on plays. That gives him an impressive 8% success rate added on plays.

Prior to this season, Lindor has been a proponent of banning the shift. Part of the reason was to permit him to be the shortstop he can be. Last season, he told Sports Illustrated, “Let me do me. Let me make the crazy play. Let me be like, ‘O.K., he’s going to pull the ball. I can’t be on that side of the base.’ So as the pitch goes, I run on the other side of the base—pow!—and make the play.”

He’s already put together a number of highlights this season. There was the leaping grab to rob Jorge Soler of extra bases. There was the double play started when he went up the middle and flipped the ball to McNeil. The play everyone seems to be talking about to start the season was his going into the hole to rob Bryan De La Cruz of an RBI single.

Lindor has always been a great defender. He has already won two Gold Gloves and a Platinum Glove. Since his first full season in 2016, he leads all MLB shortstops with a 117 OAA. However, so far this season, it just seems Lindor is playing at another level. In fact, we even see it on the plays he doesn’t make.

Omar Narváez threw the ball away on a Christian Yelich stolen base attempt. Lindor deked Yelich into staying at second base instead of going to third. The play saved Narváez from an error, and to this point in the season, the Mets still have not committed an error.

The defense from Lindor has been noticeable to start the season. Showalter said after the April 1 game, “He has taken his defensive game to another level. He is moving his feet really well. He is anticipating things.”

Overall, the Mets might’ve entered the season with the best up the middle infield defense in the majors. Seeing the way McNeil and Lindor have started the season, they are taking their defense to another level. We are also seeing it rub off on their teammates as they are making strong defensive plays.

As we saw in 1999, you can have a special season led by great defense. Lindor and McNeil seemed poised to make this a year just like that.

EDITOR’S NOTE: This post was first published on MMO.

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20/20 Hindsight: Mets Filet Marlins

The New York Mets played their opening series of the season, and they took 3/4 games. All-in-all, not a bad start to the season:

1.  The Mets defense was exceptional to start the season. Jeff McNeil and Francisco Lindor appear on their way to having Gold Glove caliber years, and Starling Marte might’ve made the most important play of all.

2.  Kodai Senga‘s ghost splitter was all; the more impressive in game action recording all eight strikeouts on the pitch. It’s also a good thing it really took him just one inning to fully acclimate.

3.  It took Lindor three games last season before he started hitting, and he would have a great year. Nothing to be concerned about his slow start to the season.

4.  Brandon Nimmo is back to walking a lot, which means his OBP should be through the roof this season.

5.  Justin Verlander and Jose Quintana are out, but it appears David Peterson and Tylor Megill are up to the task much like they were all of last season.

6.  Eduardo Escobar has really struggled to start the year. With the start Brett Baty is off to in Triple-A, we are going to hear the calls for him sooner rather than later.

7.  If Baty is not called up within the next week, the Mets are going to forfeit the chance to get an extra first round pick and international bonus pool money. This seems like a dubious decision to say the least.

8.  Mark Canha‘s and Tommy Pham‘s bat looked very slow to start the season, but they turned it on the last two games. At least with Sandy Alcantara and Jesus Luzardo, you still have to wonder if velocity will be an issue for Canha, but for now, he seems like he will be productive.

9.  The only Mets reliever to allow a run is John Curtiss, who was on the bubble to even make the team. For now, it seems like the Mets bullpen will be fine without Edwin Díaz.

10. Way too much was made by some people over Max Scherzer allowing three runs. He was completely dominant over the first five innings, and he had one bad inning. He will be fine and pitch like an ace again this season.

11. It seems like something that only happens to the Mets, but somehow poor defenders like Garrett Cooper and Jorge Soler looked like Keith Hernandez and Roberto Clemente in the field this past series.

12. Jeff McNeil hit a lot of balls hard right at someone. Not what you expected to see with the elimination of the shift.

13. The games did move much faster, but there is still going to be some issues to be ironed out. For example, McNeil getting assessed a strike because of Pete Alonso at first base. After the game, MLB admitted a strike should not have been assessed against McNeil.

14. Any Mets fans rejoicing in Jacob deGrom and Chris Bassitt struggling is an outright fool. First, they did nothing to the Mets. Second, it meant you enjoyed the Philadelphia Phillies and St. Louis Cardinals offense going off. Nothing says I’m a Mets fan more than rooting for the Phillies and Cardinals.

15. We knew the bases being closer together meant not only more stolen bases but more opportunities to take an extra base. We didn’t know that meant Daniel Vogelbach going first to third and scoring on shallow sacrifice flies.

16. Jazz Chisholm Jr.was not good at all in center for the Miami Marlins. That is going to be an issue for that team all season.

17. Omar Narváez. has looked PHENOMENAL in all aspects of the game so far. If he is going to be this good, the Mets are a different level team than originally anticipated.

18. Dennis Santana might’ve been a find for the Mets.

19. Alonso was safe at first base.

20. This was a good start for the Mets. They took three out of four, and their best players haven’t quite gotten going just yet. Hopefully, this is a sign we are in for a special 2023.

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Ghost Fork Was Spooky

Entering the 2023 season, the biggest question mark in the rotation was Kodai Senga. We knew he was good based upon what he did in Japan, but how good he was going to be is ultimately what will determine how good of a rotation and by extension a team the New York Mets will be.

It may not seem this way, but the Mets have had more Japanese players in their history than any other team. Of course, as we saw with Kazuo Matsui, the Mets haven’t always had the best luck with Japanese imports. Of course, part of that was the Mets creating unrealistic expectations and flat out ignoring advice on how to help those players adapt to Major League Baseball.

Jeff Wilpon is gone, and the Mets are run completely differently under Steve Cohen. Perhaps, that is part of the reason why we did not hear any of the old anxiety related to the Mets previous failures with Japanese players. Seeing Senga on the mound for his first game, we may never hear it again.

Things did not start well for him. He allowed a hit to Luis Arraez, threw a wild pitch, and allowed an RBI double to Jorge Soler. That’s as disastrous a start to your career as you can get. One run was in without an out. Fortunately, the Mets did score two for him in the top of the first, so the lead had not evaporated.

That seemed like a technicality as he then walked Jazz Chisholm Jr. and Avisail Garcia to load the bases. That brought up Yuli Gurriel. Bases loaded and no outs. It was then we first saw Senga release that ghost split as a true weapon.

Senga then came back and struck out Jesus Sanchez. Again, it was that ghost fork. That Miami Marlins rally was fading as quickly as that ghost fork. Senga would need some help from his defense as Starling Marte made a great catch in right to end the inning.

The Marlins missed their only chance as they would only collect one more hit and walk against Senga in his 5 1/3 innings of work. If he had not needed to throw 36 pitches in the first innings, he might’ve gone deeper. The fact he was able to go deeper into the game is a testament to how he just flat out embarrassed the Marlins hitters who literally had no chance against that ghost fork.

Overall, Senga struck out eight, and the Mets went on to win 5-1. More than that, Senga showed us how great he could be. While it is far too early to talk about these things, perhaps he could be the ace of this staff. Yes, he and that ghost fork were that good on Sunday. We will see just how good it is the rest of the year.

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