Jonah

Tong

Tong struck out six, but he also walked three while throwing 50 of 86 pitches for strikes. It hasn’t been the start to the season that many hoped for Tong, as he has a 5.68 ERA and 1.38 WHIP in 25 1/3 innings. He has struck out 38 batters over that time, but he needs to get the walks and home runs in check if he’s going to push for a spot in the Mets’ rotation.

Mendoza added that they haven’t assessed whether Senga will make his next start, but he’s still getting the dreaded vote of confidence after being lit up for seven runs over 3 1/3 innings during Friday’s meltdown against the Cubs. The 33-year-old was tagged for six hits, including a pair of homers, in the abbreviated outing. It’s easy to write off one wind-fueled poor outing as an aberration, but Senga has coughed up seven runs in back-to-back outings. It would most likely be veteran lefty Sean Manaea, or someone like top pitching prospect Jonah Tong, moving into the rotation if New York decides to make a change. His stuff would certainly play up in shorter bursts out of the bullpen. It’s been a disastrous season for the Mets overall, but they’re sticking with Senga for now.

Tong did strike out 10 in this one, but he also walked three and allowed two home runs. The 22-year-old has missed plenty of bats so far this season with a 23/10 K/BB ratio in 15 1/3 innings, but he has also allowed 15 runs (12 earned) on 11 hits. He’ll need to keep working on getting the command in check.

There’s no path for Tong to pitch in New York at the moment with a full starting rotation and Sean Manaea languishing in the bullpen. The 22-year-old boasts some big-time strikeout upside and could be an impactful fantasy contributor once he gets a real shot.

Tong was hit hard during a brief five-game cameo with the Mets late last season and failed to make the club’s season-opening rotation out of spring training. The 22-year-old top pitching prospect offers enough strikeout potential to be a useful fantasy arm but he’s going to have to wait for his opportunity with New York’s rotation mix overflowing with both talent and depth.

All three runs scored in the second, which opened with a ringing triple and then featured three bloop hits in front of outfielders. The hardest of them was hit 75 mph. Tong, who has already been sent down by the Mets, avoided the loss in the game, which the Mets dropped 7-5. That’s unfortunate only because Kai-Wei Teng got the win for Houston, and Teng beats Tong had headline potential.

Tong is a well-known prospect, but this was always going to be where he started the season after the team added Freddy Peralta and had veterans Sean Manaea, Kodai Senga, Clay Holmes, and David Peterson all healthy to start the season. Tong pitched more MLB innings last season than he did Triple-A innings, so the team will have him continue to develop in the minor leagues with the hope that he can push for big league innings in the second half of the year. However, it should be noted that Tong is just 22 years old and had a 7.71 ERA in his five MLB starts last year and did not look good this spring, so there is a strong chance that he is behind both Tobias Myers and Christian Scott in the Mets’ starting pitcher pecking order right now.

Tong also struck out three and didn’t walk a single batter in the outing. Obviously, the five hits are not what you’d like to see, but Tong had a 63 percent strike rate and also racked up a 27 percent whiff rate. His cutter, in particular, was effective for him on Tuesday. The issue was that he threw first-pitch strikes to just five of the 12 batters he faced, which caused him to try to get into many hitter-friendly counts that led to those base hits. He’ll look to remedy that his next time out.

Nolan Gorman supplied all of the runs with his homer in the third. Tong debuted a new cutter today, throwing it 18 times in the 50-pitch outing. He didn’t throw any curves, which was a pitch he used 12% of the time in the majors last season, and he showed a revamped slider, which averaged just 82 mph instead of the 87 mph it was last year. Those are some rather big changes for a pitcher who was as successful as anyone in the minors last season. Barring multiple rotation injuries for the Mets, Tong figures to return to Triple-A to open 2026.

Marino reported that “Jonah Tong’s name briefly came up in talks with the Brewers about Freddy Peralta before the Mets quickly ended that discussion.” The Mets then rejected a follow-up offer that was Brandon Sproat and Jett Williams for Peralta. Given that Peralta is a free agent at the end of the upcoming season, it makes sense that the Mets may not want to deal one of their top prospect who could have multiple years of value; however, it feels likely that some team will be willing to do that to acquire Peralta.