Kodai Senga made a rehab start for Triple-A Syracuse Saturday night but left after the first inning, and now we know why: he had a bout of right triceps tightness during that outing, and Mets manager Carlos Mendoza thinks it’s not serious but is enough to shut Senga down for the regular season.
I think it’s safe to say that for the regular season he’s not going to be a player for us,” Mendoza said Sunday. “We’re not going to put him in a major league game until he clears all the steps.”
The Mets had been hopeful he could pitch this weekend in Milwaukee in some fashion. He will Senga will continue throwing, but the Mets don’t know if he’ll be an option, or in what way, if they make a run in October.
unclear what kind of timeline he is facing for a return and whether the Mets would consider him an option for October (provided the team reaches the postseason) at some point.
“Hopefully we’re making those decisions, right? “Mendoza said. “It’s been a hard year for him. He’s worked his tail off. You feel for him. Every time he wants to push it and he wants to take the baseball, he’s dealing with something. Hopefully, this is nothing serious, but it’s going to set him back a little bit.”
The Mets’ 2-1 win over Philly Sunday night delayed the Phils’ clinching of the NL East another day – they are now five games up with six to play, meaning there’s an outside chance – and New York is tied with Arizona for the second and third wild card spots, two games up on Atlanta.
Senga was back on the mound Saturday for the first time since suffering a calf strain in his first and only MLB start of the season, and after issuing a leadoff walk, he got s strikeout, flyout, and strikeout to end the first with 15 pitches.
However, when the Mets returned to the field after plating eight runs in the bottom of the frame, it was righty Trey McLoughlin, and not Senga, on the mound, which both Senga and the Syracuse skipper chalked up to the long inning.
“He was just trying to get his work in,” manager Dick Scott told Alex Rubinson of the Syracuse Daily Orange. “After the first inning, he felt like that was enough.”
“Pitching is a big balance between my whole entire body,” Senga said through an interpreter. “Nothing is wrong.”
However, his velocity was down over the course of the outing, even as Scott told Rubinson that was intentional.
“He was throwing pretty hard early and was having control problems,” Scott said. “He made some adjustments and just tried to get some strikes in there and get some quick outs.”