Senga Arrives in St. Lucie With Injury Concerns

The New York Mets have assembled an impressive starting staff of big names.

Justin Verlander is a future Hall of Famer, so is Max Scherzer, and now Kodai Senga, the biggest name in Japan joining them. The first two starters are truly top-tier aces. Senga has that quality too, but he has an elbow issue. The Mets have assured everyone that it’s not a problem, but I’m worried about it.

Senga Will Be A Marketing Sensation

The Mets are taking a calculated risk. Senga will give the team a big financial reward with advertising, merchandise, and fans in the stands. All of that makes Senga worth the risk, but it doesn’t take away from the fact that he has an issue that can’t be ignored. He has wear on his elbow. It showed in an MRI, but Jon Heyman was on damage control soon after. I’m no doctor but I’m not buying this explanation. It doesn’t make sense.

Senga By The Numbers

In 11 seasons in the Japanese League from age 19-29, Senga threw 275 innings. If you look at Cory Kluber’s numbers, he pitched 11 seasons and threw 255 games. Considering Kluber only pitched in seven games in 2019, he was going to throw the same number of games as Senga, so that doesn’t work for me. If Senga has wear, he has wear that you have to worry about. Wear is wear, and no matter how you look at this the Mets are rolling the dice on him. They want him for the 2023 run. That’s what they are counting on, after that, let’s see how durable he can be. This is where Steven Cohen can take chances other owners won’t. He can shoulder potential losses.

You Can’t Put The Mets and Yankees In The Same Division

I saw the Athletic did an article about this. The premise is awful. Just the thought of this makes me ill. The Mets and Yankees can never be in the same league let alone the same division. Nobody wants to see two teams from the same city in the same division. Ask bar owners about this. They would lose business. Both teams would play similar schedules. New York fans would hate it. It would get boring. There’s something special between the Mets vs. the Yankees because it’s still interleague. Before interleague play, there was more intrigue but, ok, they changed that. If MLB were to change this, the games would be so-so. It wouldn’t be special anymore.