Jonah Tong followed the “opener” and shut the door on a couple of self-created rallies.
Tong generated three whiffs on 11 swings on 17 cutters. He set the tone for a staff that stranded 17 runners on base.
The Mets’ top-ranked pitching prospect earned his first win of the season Wednesday with 3 ²/₃ innings of relief in a 4-2 victory against the Reds.
Until making his MLB season debut last week, Tong hadn’t come out of the bullpen since 2024 at Single-A, according to Baseball Reference.
“I’ve been prepared in a lot of ways in my professional career,” Tong said. “I’m out here just to pitch. It doesn’t really matter when, where, how many. My job is to put the guys in the best possible chance to win and go compete.”
Entering with a 1-0 lead in the top of the second inning, Tong’s command was spotty as he walked four and threw only 44 of 76 pitches for strikes. He scattered three hits.
“Some longer counts toward the end than I’d like,” Tong said. “Just a lot of things I think I can work on moving forward, but overall happy I was able to clean some innings for the guys.”
But Tong gut-checked to strand two runners on base in the second inning, two more in the third after his throwing error opened the door for an unearned run to score, and one in the fourth.
He turned over a two-on, two-out jam to Tobias Myers, who needed one pitch to escape trouble.
“I thought he was good the first couple innings attacking the strike zone,” manager Carlos Mendoza said. “He doesn’t make that play and it completely changes the outing — cost him an extra 20 pitches. I felt like he was getting tired toward the end, but he competed and found a way.”
Tong was electric in 22 starts in the minors last year before posting a 7.74 ERA across his first five MLB starts.
He was off to a miserable start this season at Triple-A (5.68 ERA) but received a desperation promotion anyway and came out of the bullpen to throw a scoreless, game-ending three innings against the Marlins.
Wednesday was more of a traditional “opener” strategy, with Tong scheduled to replace Huascar Brazobán after one inning to create matchup advantages, according to Mendoza.
“We’re going to need him,” Mendoza said. “We’re going to continue to get creative here, whether it’s opener, using him as a bulk [reliever]. We’re going to have some off days coming up, so there’s a lot of different ways we could go.”
Said Tong: “The cutter was cool to see today, see how that plays. As we go forward, it’s just being on the attack for the entire game. I felt like I let up a little bit toward the end.”
