Now accustomed to being featured in fine print for a game in which a beloved former Met earns top billing, Jonah Tong fared better than the last time.
Last time, when Tong took the mound to face off with Jacob deGrom in his return to Citi Field, he did not make it out of the first inning in the worst outing of his career.
A season later — when the 35,800 on hand were cheering for his opponent and booed Tong at one point for walking Pete Alonso — he authored the best outing of his career.
On a night on which fans pined for the past and cursed the present Mets front office, Tong made his best argument yet that he should be a part of the club’s future.
The young right-hander recorded his first quality start in his 11th career major league appearance, completing six innings without allowing an earned run in what became a 2-1 loss to the Orioles on Monday.
“Very, very effective in every way,” interim manager Andy Green said of Tong, who struck out six and allowed one unearned run on four hits and, notably, just one walk. “Demeanor outstanding. … [He] was a bulldog on the attack today, and I think we love seeing that from him.”
The game, though, took a backseat to the singular opponent, virtually everyone on the field who was not Alonso viewed by the crowd as at best an afterthought and at worst an obstruction to the history they desired.
The crowd wanted an Alonso moment — preferably the 300th homer of his career, regardless of the fact he was playing for the opposing team — and thus Tong, a popular top prospect, was briefly the enemy.
During Alonso’s third-inning plate appearance, he smoked a long, would-be homer that went foul to left field and would have brought the crowd to its feet — if the crowd were not already on its feet cheering for the Baltimore first baseman. Alonso returned to the plate and walked, which elicited boos and a Tong smile.
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“I think next time [the fans] got to give the pitcher a little more love, too,” said Francisco Lindor with a smile after praising the love the fans showed Alonso.
“We’re proud of the young kid on the mound that stepped off the mound,” Green added. “Didn’t let anything derail him, attacked every hitter, pitched as well as he possibly could.
“… He’s taken some real major strides, and it’s fun to see.”
The real strides have come after Tong took real steps back, struggling after being arguably rushed to the majors last season and working on both arsenal and arm-angle tweaks with Triple-A Syracuse this season that made it a year of lessons rather than major league breakthroughs.
But he pitched well enough in August to earn another major league chance in September. And he might be coming out on the other side of what he acknowledged has been a “long year” stronger.
“I think [the 2026 struggles are] something I’m going to have to live with, and I’m happy for it,” Tong said. “I mean, there’s a lot of times in life that you’re going to struggle, and the best learning happens through that. I welcome it.”
