Adam Ottavino, former New York Mets reliever, has hit out at his old organization and accused the team of irresponsibly handling its pitching staff during the past season. On his Baseball & Coffee podcast, published on Wednesday, the veteran pitcher pointed directly at manager Carlos Mendoza and the technical department for not properly caring for the arms of the relievers
Ottavino began by listing the pitchers who suffered injuries during the campaign – including Tylor Megill, Dedniel Nunez, Danny Young, Frankie Montas and Reed Garrett – and remarked on the club’s negative record: using 46 pitchers in the 2025 season, the highest figure in MLB history.
“This is embarrassing, pathetic”: Ottavino’s explosive message
The former pitcher claimed that, had he been on the team in 2025, he would not have allowed the situation to get out of hand. “At least half of these guys wouldn’t have fallen apart. I would have protected them myself; I would have stood between them,” he said, in one of the harshest passages of his speech.
Ottavino also suggested that there was a lack of leadership within the clubhouse to question the manager. “Unfortunately, this year no one was willing to stand up to Carlos. I guess it was just me. There’s a little problem there,” he said, claiming that the lack of resistance allowed the mishandling to be repeated throughout the campaign.
Accusations of poor communication and lack of empathy
Beyond the overuse of arms, Ottavino accused the organization of not properly training players to stay healthy and forcing them to compete even when they felt discomfort. “I think he has no idea what he’s doing with relievers, how to keep them healthy or even how to care about them. There’s no communication, there’s no empathy, there’s no tact when someone gets hurt”, he said of Mendoza.
The former Met acknowledged that the manager knew how to work under pressure, but insisted that the club must change its approach so as not to continue to compromise the health of its pitchers. “If they keep going down this path, they’re going to screw themselves. You can’t injure so many players every year,” he stressed.
A closing with annoyance and warning
Ottavino also criticized the team’s recent narrative, which in 2024 boasted of keeping the squad healthy. According to him, that “had nothing to do with them,” and he considered it unfair that injured players were the ones who paid the consequences of poor planning.
The veteran pitcher, who pitched just 1 2/3 innings with the Yankees last season, ended his message visibly frustrated: “These are the guys that should be playing, so it pisses me off.”
The Mets organization has not commented on the former player’s statements, but his words put the handling of pitching in Queens back under the spotlight after a season marked by injuries, constant rotation and internal questioning.
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