After struggling in his most recent start, the New York Mets have announced that Kodai Senga is being moved to the bullpen. Looking at his last start there are reasons to be potentially optimistic about this move.
In the first inning Kodai Senga averaged 97.8 miles per hour on his fastball and ran a 50% whiff rate and 40% chase rate. He only threw his three best pitches, his fastball, forkball and slider. He topped out at 98.9 miles per hour and got two strikeouts.
The rest of the game he averaged 95.3 miles per hour on his fastball. He only generated a 16.7% whiff rate on his fastball the rest of the game. He struggled to get hitters to chase his fastball while his cutter, sweeper and sinker were completely ineffective.
The hardest part of this transition will be the mental side of becoming a reliever, something Senga has never done in the majors before. Time will tell how he adapts to that side of it, but from a pure stuff standpoint he looks like a player that could benefit highly from shorter outings.
