Booming Mets prospect was nearly perfect last night, continues to raise his ceiling

It took 19 stats in Brooklyn for the New York Mets to decide it was time to promote Jonah Tong. The impressive right-handed pitcher was 5-4 with a 3.71 ERA with the Brooklyn Cyclones after his even more superb 18.2 shutout innings in St. Lucie to begin the year. Tong has been a strikeout master and it continued on Thursday during his debut with the Double-A Binghamton Rumble Ponies. In fact, he was an error away from tossing 6 perfect innings.

Tong was one out away from perfection in all 6 of his innings. At 77 pitches, he was probably right up against the limit of how far the coaching staff would let him go. If there’s any silver lining to the perfecto getting broken up, it allowed him to strike out Spencer Jones all three times he faced him. Remember that factoid in two or three years when the Mets and New York Yankees play in the Subway Series.

Tong would get robbed of the win. With two outs in the ninth, the Somerset Patriots tied the game at one on a home run. Jaylen Palmer knocked one out in the bottom half of the inning to at least make it a win for the Rumble Ponies.

Mets prospect Jonah Tong continues to raise his ceiling

There aren’t too many pitching prospects ahead of Tong either in theory or purely looking at the numbers. Christian Scott making his MLB debut and Brandon Sproat speeding through the minor league system are about it. A crash in Triple-A this season by Blade Tidwell, Mike Vasil, and Dom Hamel have pushed those through to the backburner. Tong continues to rise.

It has been an extremely disappointing year for Mets prospects. Injuries played a major role in this. We’ve barely seen Jett Williams who entered the year as the number one prospect. Drew Gilbert suffered an early injury to set him back. Is Luisangel Acuna ever going to get to the show for the Mets?

Tong has been one of the few bright spots. Going from a wild 20-year-old with more walks than innings pitched last season to a guy consistently putting together dominant starts like his most recent, Tong is showing he truly is a booming part of the Mets future. He is a product of the organization’s farm system who has gone from a 7th round draft pick to a legitimate top 10 prospect within the system with room to move up even higher. 

An almost perfect evening in his Double-A debut helped cap off a remarkable season. He should get one more start in Double-A before the year is over. Once again, expect something incredible.