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The New York Mets are the best team in baseball to open the 2025 season, but another harsh injury blow could change that.
Going into Wednesday’s game against the Arizona Diamondbacks with a 21-9 record, the Mets announced that left-handed reliever Danny Young was placed on the 15-day injured list with an elbow sprain. That injury could lead to season-ending surgery and it puts the Mets bullpen in a precarious position.
With Young and A.J. Minter out with injury, the Mets’ bullpen don’t have a left-handed reliever, which could make things tough for team manager Carlos Mendoza as they face right-handed hitters.
When asked about how the Mets might respond to this latest injury, though, Mendoza suggested the team might go with an all-righty relief corps for the foreseeable future.
“We’ve got some righties there that can get lefties out,” Mendoza said, per SNY’s Phillip Martinez. “Whether it’s (Jose) Butto, (Huascar) Brazoban, Reed Garrettt, for sure, (Max) Kranick has been doing a really good job. We feel good with our options, now we have to decide what our next move is. We like our righties’ ability to get left-handed hitters out.”
The Mets did call up southpaw Brandon Waddell from Triple-A for Wednesday’s game and he took over in the third inning, pitched well and left to a standing ovation. However, after that performance, he might profile as a starter for the Mets rather than their sole lefty reliever.
“But for one night, for one spot when the Mets needed an extra member of their rotation, he was ‘unbelievable,’ Mendoza said,” according to the New York Post’s Andrew Crane.
As the Mets look to keep up their hot start amid some persistent pitching injuries, Waddell could be a key addition. But it looks like they feel pretty good about the righties in the bullpen, at least for the time being.
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Peter Chawaga is a veteran journalist covering Major League Baseball for The Sporting News. His MLB reporting has included feature interviews with commissioner Rob Manfred and Hall of Fame slugger David Ortiz, salary analysis, player rankings and more. He has covered baseball for Forbes, Yardbarker, Pitcher List, Athlon and other outlets.
With over ten years of newsroom experience, he has previously covered finance, technology, arts, and culture for newspapers, magazines, and websites nationwide. He graduated from Wake Forest University with a degree in English and journalism.
English (US)