Former All-Star is giving the NY Mets a reason to keep him on the roster

When the New York Mets signed Chris Devenski to a minor league deal, it came as a shock to many of us who knew the name but didn’t follow him closely to see how long had passed since his best seasons. Devenski was an All-Star middle reliever for the Houston Astros in 2017, just his second year in the big leagues. He has bounced around the league over the last few years, most recently pitching 26.2 frames for the Tampa Bay Rays in 2024. He was a failed project there, pitching to a 6.75 ERA in 26.2 innings after a much more successful albeit brief run in 2023.

Devenski, 34, has been kind enough to routinely accept his minor league reassignments as needed. He has the service time to reject these demotions. He has played nicely with the Mets and willingly accepted the outright assignment to Syracuse on more than one occasion. Considering the two sides came to an agreement on a deal on October 28, it would appear that he was eager to come here.

With the way he is pitching, Devenski may be playing his way into having other teams request his services which would, as a result, guarantee him more playing time in the majors.

The Mets are gaining reasons to keep Chris Devenski on the active roster

Devenski now has a 1.93 ERA in 9.1 innings. It hasn’t been a deceptive performance. His 0.75 WHIP reminds us how little he has had to throw out of the stretch. While the strikeout numbers are low at 6.8 K/9, the run prevention and low hard-hit percentage (30.8%) have all helped to make him a key member of the pitching staff whenever called upon.

Out of necessity but also maybe a little more trust, the Mets have entrusted Devenski in a larger role of late. He started their bullpen game versus the New York Yankees, tossing 2 shutout innings against his former postseason foe from his Astros days. Over the weekend against the Kansas City Royals, Devenski pitched an inning in back-to-back days. He finished off Friday’s win and came back less than 24 hours later to toss a scoreless 7th on Saturday.

On a roll of late, Devenski’s lone blip came in his Mets debut back on April 30 versus the Arizona Diamondbacks. Appearing to be one in a long line of Mets pitchers who struggled in their first appearance and could’ve been immediately DFA’d, the veteran has been brilliant ever since. No runs have been scored against him in any of the 7 relief appearances since. He has walked just one batter (in his most recent appearance) and surrendered just 3 hits. Only one, a double on May 31, went for extra bases.

It’s too early to declare this an exceptional victory. The Mets may begin to lose the luxury of being able to keep him through the carousel of relievers as he’d surely get picked up by another team if he was to elect free agency. A lot of attention was put on players like Huascar Brazoban and Max Kranick early in the season for being savvy steals by David Stearns; rightfully so. We need to start paying attention to Devenski who appears to have corrected whatever turned him from rising All-Star into a journeyman.