The New York Mets have officially made a decision to finalize the starting rotation.
With Kodai Senga on the injured list with a shoulder strain, the Mets had Luis Severino, Jose Quintana, Sean Manaea, and Adrian Houser locked in rotation spots. For the fifth starter spot, the team had a difficult decision to make between Tylor Megill and Jose Butto, both of whom have looked impressive this spring.
In the end, the Mets chose Megill as the fifth starter, while Butto was optioned to the Triple-A Syracuse Mets. Both of these were announced by Mets manager Carlos Mendoza.
The first, and likely most important, reason was Megill’s significant advantage in experience at the major league level. Butto, who turned 26 on Tuesday, has only 46 innings to his name across 2022 and 2023, appearing in 10 games (eight starts). On the other hand, the 28-year-old Megill already has a noteworthy body of work with 263 innings and 58 appearances (52 starts) over the past three seasons.
The second reason was Megill’s strong finish to the 2023 season; despite finishing the year with a 4.70 ERA, he had a 2.55 mark over his final six starts. Finally, the third was that Megill was already built up after an offseason throwing program, which included the development of a splitter.
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