The Mets are converting Kodai Senga into a high-leverage reliever; here's why it makes sense

CLEVELAND – Kodai Senga isn’t new to this, you know.

Plenty of people might’ve scoffed Tuesday when he was tasked with getting the final three outs of the Mets' win over the Guardians, but Senga – the pitcher so many assume is dedicated to his routine, to predictability – wasn’t one of them.

It took Senga 18 pitches to preserve the four-run lead, despite issuing a walk, and 13 of them were fastballs, with the hardest thrown at 98.8 mph. After, I asked him if he felt an extra buzz coming into the game in that situation – that adrenaline spike that fuels so many late-game relievers.

“I don’t know if I had the opportunity to experience that just today,” Senga said via interpreter. “I have in previous games I’ve pitched in my career…I feel pretty well-adjusted to the routine and the preparation part. In Japan, I started off as a long guy [and] turned into a high-leverage guy later in the year. I’ve experienced that."

Senga wants his old role back, but he knows he hasn’t earned it – “If I say I want to be a starter, the team could just tell me, 'look at your stats', ” he said, referencing  his unsightly 8.47 ERA – and has shown a willingness to adapt in a way that belies the narrative painted around him. When he was injured in 2024, then-manager Carlos Mendoza often hinted at Senga’s inflexibility, even at times mentioning that he didn’t have too much insight on his pitcher’s recovery. There was this idea, too, that Senga would only work in a six-man rotation – something he vehemently denied this past spring training.

Since then, Senga has agreed to a Triple-A assignment that he could have rejected, bounced back and forth from bullpen to starter, didn’t pitch for 13 straight days before getting conscripted into starting duty on July 31 when the Mets scratched Freddy Peralta, and now will at least temporarily be used in high-leverage situations. Tuesday, he found out about the role change “today, before the game.” When he was down for almost two weeks ahead of what was supposed to be Peralta’s start, “you almost get to the point where it’s like, I’m probably not pitching again,” he said.

You might say, so what? Senga is so far removed from the ace we saw in his American debut, and there are significant questions as to whether he can help this team in the future.

But there are a few reasons to care: 1. It will be very hard to move Senga, who has one more guaranteed year on his contract worth $15 million, and he could conceivably have a role on this team in 2027. 2. Interim manager Andy Green may very well be onto something when he announced the Mets intended to experiment with Senga in one-inning, high leverage roles, and 3. When Senga is good, he’s very, very good.

Which is why this is a worthwhile experiment. When Senga first made his debut in Japan, he relied on his electric fastball and deceptive ghost fork, with occasional cameos from two other pitches. But as he transitioned to starter, the repertoire grew, and has grown to be unwieldy at times– a six and sometimes seven-pitch mix that tended to complicate things more than needed. 

And it got into his head.

“As of right now, when I’m trying to find the strike zone, that’s not when I’m able to throw freely,” he said on June 23 – a disastrous start against the Cubs that punched his ticket to the bullpen. “When I’m able to throw freely, that’s when the pitches are in the strike zone. Whether that’s psychological, it’s hard to say.”

It seems counterintuitive, doesn’t it? A guy may be in his own head, so why not introduce more uncertainty into his life?

But Senga might profile well as a reliever, and frankly, after gutting their bullpen at the trade deadline, there aren’t too many good options. Like he did in Japan, Senga can simplify his offerings, relying heavily on a two or sometimes three-pitch mix, and he can dial up the velocity. He has a 9.66 ERA as a starter, and a less-disastrous but still unfavorable 5.79 ERA as a reliever this season.

“The construction of our ‘pen did not allow it when we were carrying [A.J.] Minter and Brazo [Huascar Brazoban] and Weave [Luke Weaver] and [Brooks] Raley, and it does now,” Green said before the game Tuesday. “I don’t think you can expect [Senga] to pitch three out of four [games] at this time, but I do think in his right arm is 100 mph and a nasty forkball and that profile plays for a late-inning reliever.”

After, Green said they “trusted the heartbeat today and been in some big situations…[and] as long as he’s throwing each pitch with conviction and belief that he’s going to get the guy out, that’s what we’re after.”

The Mets might not ever get back the Senga of old, but if they can find value in him, it’s a shot worth taking. And maybe one key is not giving him neither the time nor the option to overthink and overpitch, and to let him do something he was pretty good at a long time ago.

What do they have to lose?

By Laura Albanese

laura.albanese@newsday.com@AlbaneseLaura

Laura Albanese is the Mets beat writer for Newsday. She's been covering MLB since 2014 after starting at Newsday as an intern seven years earlier.