Jeff Passan, ESPNO, Oct 4, 2024, 5:26pm ET
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Author of “The Arm: Inside the Billion-Dollar Secret of the Most Valuable Commodity in Sports”
PHILADELPHIA – New York Mets right-hander Kodai Senga will start Game 1 of the National League Division Series on Saturday against the Philadelphia Phillies after missing the past two months with a calf injury.
Senga, who at 31 was the Mets’ best pitcher last season, has not pitched since July 29, when he left his only outing of the season with a calf strain after 5⅓ innings. Shoulder and triceps injuries sidelined Senga for the first four months of the season.
Senga and Mets manager Carlos Mendoza was coy when asked how deep into the game he could play. That will be decided by Mendoza and Mets coach Jeremy Hefner, Senga said.
“I’m ready for anything,” Senga said. “If they say 10 shots, I’m in 10 shots. If they say 200, I’m in 200.”
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Senga’s return is a welcome sight for the Mets after a run to the Division Series that exhausted their pitching. New York played a doubleheader on Monday — earning a spot in the first game — and followed up with games the next three days in Milwaukee. The last win, a dramatic 4-2 win punctuated by Pete Alonso’s three-run homer in the ninth inning, continued a magical run from a team that was 24-35 in early June.
Senga had hoped to return at the end of the regular season but held out after triceps tightness ended his minor league rehab start on September 22. He continued to work at the Mets’ complex in Florida and said he was told Wednesday that if the Mets beat the Brewers and he was healthy, he would start the first game.
“We went through it for a whole year,” Mendoza said. “And the times when he goes out and faces hitters or throws a lot of bullpen and he’s not feeling well, he always lets us know. And that wasn’t the case in this situation. He was the one who called us, and he wanted to know what we were thinking in case “We were here for a division series or potential NLCS.”
Senga has been working on his form through live batting practice sessions, and in the final session, “he threw a lot,” Mendoza said.
In his first season with the Mets, Senga was one of the best pitchers in baseball, putting up a 2.98 ERA over 166⅓ innings and striking out 202. His vaunted “ghost fork,” a devastating fastball with split toes, was among his best swings. -And missed shots in a match last season.
New York is counting on and will need this version of Senga to return. Former Mets and Phillies shortstop Zack Wheeler, a postseason standout, is scheduled to oppose him in Game 1, adding to the degree of difficulty already inherent in going from live BP to more than 40,000 screaming fans at Citizens Bank Park.
“You can get your stuff right in the bullpen, and you can kind of get everything called,” said Mets outfielder David Peterson, who recorded the save in the wild-card win and could play with Senga in Game 1. “But I think we were We’ve been playing a lot of high-leverage games for a long time now, so I think just getting back into an atmosphere like that, getting back into the speed of the game, is something that’s going to be a challenge when you’re back like that.
“But I have no doubt with the work he has done and the way he has prepared himself, he is ready for the challenge.”
Senga said that before he was ready to start, he needed to “improve my physical and mental condition and prepare” – and once he did that, his previous connections with the team eased the path towards a comeback.
“If I thought it was hard, I wouldn’t be ready,” Senga said. “So I’m ready for [Game 1]. “However I can control my body and control how the match goes, that will be big.”
