Just over two weeks into Sean Manaea’s reinstatement as a bulk pitcher for the Mets, the left-handed hurler is continuing to earn more trust.
Manaea strung together a strong outing in a 3-1 loss to the Braves on Saturday afternoon at Citi Field, marking his first start of the 2026 campaign amid questions of how the Mets plan to use the 34-year-old moving forward for the remainder of the season.
Going six innings, Manaea gave up just four hits and two earned runs (one homer) while registering six strikeouts in the loss.
It was the first time Manaea went six or more innings since Game 3 of the 2024 NLDS.
“Huge,” Mets manager Carlos Mendoza said. “I mean, that’s the guy that we’re going to need moving forward here. For him to go out there and give us a chance, he was pretty solid today, and against a pretty good lineup. Used all of his pitches. Competing in the strike zone. No walks. Got swings and misses.
“Just overall, that’s the guy that we saw a lot in 2024. Alive on the fastball at times. Like I said, got swings and misses. But, yeah, big pictures, man, that’s the guy we need.”
Aside from the solo homer he gave up to the Braves’ Eli White in the fourth inning, Manaea didn’t give Atlanta much to work with. His velocity hovered in the 91-93 mph range.
Over his past eight appearances, Manaea has posted a 3.33 ERA with four times as many strikeouts (28) as walks (7).
While Manaea said it has felt good to see his hard work pay off lately, the Indiana native wouldn’t say if he feels as good as he did in 2024.
“I think having a solid routine, and some of the kind of deficiency that I had, like my mechanics and all that stuff, I feel like we’ve been really cleaning all that stuff up,” Manaea said. “It’s kind of like that snowball effect where I start feeling good and just like that positive snowball effect so. I think it slowly happened over time over the last two months.”
Asked what was behind the decision to give Manaea the start on Saturday, Mets manager Carlos Mendoza expressed the necessity of it. He said putting Manaea on the mound on Saturday was “an easy call for us.”
Mendoza has previously said that they are comfortable pushing Manaea to 80-85 pitches if needed. He reached 84 pitches on Saturday, throwing 59 for strikes.
As a bulk pitcher, Manaea has been in the 70-75 range.
With numerous injuries to the Mets rotation, including Kodai Senga and Clay Holmes, Manaea has become an important piece if the Mets — sitting 5 ½ games back of the NL wild card after Saturday’s loss — hope to make up the ground they’ve lost early on this season.
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Manaea partially credited his turnaround to how he’s thrown his sweeper lately, noting that “throwing it hard” and “selling it” has been key for him.
“I can definitely see him getting to a conventional starting pitcher,” Mendoza said of Manaea recently. “He continues to throw the ball the way he’s been doing it, we’ve seen that he’s a guy that can carry a rotation. We’re open to anything. At the end of the day, we need this guy to get big outs for us and provide innings for us.”