Carson Benge
Week: 6 G, 21 AB, .333/.481/.714, 7 H, 0 2B, 1 3B, 2 HR, 4 BB, 2 K, 1/1 SB
2025 Season: 60 G, 225 AB, .302/.417/.480, 68 H, 18 2B, 5 3B, 4 HR, 41 BB, 50 K, 15/17 SB, .372 BABIP (High-A) / 32 G, 126 AB, .317/.407/.571, 40 H, 6 2B, 1 3B, 8 HR, 18 BB, 23 K, 4/6 SB, .337 BABIP (Double-A) / 24 G, 90 AB, .178/.272/.311, 16 H, 1 2B, 1 3B, 2 HR, 9 BB, 19 K, 3/3 SB, .188 BABIP
Carson Benge has had a rough go of it since being promoted to Triple-A Syracuse. All in all, prior to the past week, he was hitting
.130 /.197 /.188 in 18 games and an even more putrid .089/.125/.111 since returning from his stint on the injured list due to a HBP in the hand. Even if the season ended before Benge could turn it back on this past week, there really would have been very little to actually worry about, as the outfielder’s performance could have very easily been hand-waved away by an abnormally low .154 BABIP in a small sample size in which he was potentially still compromised by his injury in a season in which he’s played almost twice the number of official games than he had ever done so. As has been the From Complex To Queens mantra, even when numbers don’t actually matter or mean anything, it is still always nicer to see good ones than bad ones. In this case, Benge putting up suboptimal numbers in a few weeks in Syracuse at the end of the year is not going to change anyone’s opinions on things, but it is nice to see him turn it on one final time this season.
With the outfielder not going to the Arizona Fall League, his 2025 season is officially done. In 116 games with the Cyclones, Rumble Ponies, and Syracuse Mets, he hit a cumulative .281/.385/.472 with 25 doubles, 7 triples, 15 home runs, 22 stolen bases in 26 attempts, and a healthy 68:92 BB:K ratio. Among players who played at least 75 games with one of the Mets’ minor league affiliates this season, his OPS (.857) was fourth highest, behind Jared Young (.969), Randy Guzman (.898), and Jacob Reimer (.870).
It was certainly a breakout season for Benge, who exceeded most expectations and outperformed even the most optimistic pre-season predictions and projections. Barring trade or catastrophic injury, it will seemingly just be a matter of time before he gets the call-up to Queens sometime in 2026.
Jack Wenninger
Week: 1 G (1 GS), 6.0 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 1 BB, 9 K (Double-A)
2025 Season: 26 G (26 GS), 135.2 IP, 114 H, 53 R, 44 ER (2.92 ERA), 42 BB, 147 K, .288 BABIP (Double-A)
Between the utter domination of Jonah Tong, the emergence of Nolan McLean, and the peaks and valleys of Brandon Sproat, Jack Wenninger has been something of a forgotten man. Being given the ball by Reid Brignac for Game One of the Eastern League Division Series against the rival Somerset Patriots, Wenninger not only rewarded his manager’s faith in him, but had his best game of 2025 (to date, as he still might pitch in the Eastern League Championship Series), allowing two baserunners over six innings, striking out nine. While his upside is not quite at the level of that above-mentioned trio, the right-hander ended up having one of the top overall statistical seasons of any player in the organization this year.
Among pitchers who threw 75 innings or more, his 2.92 ERA was fourth behind Jonah Tong (1.43), Nolan McLean (2.45), Will Watson (2.60), and Noah Hall (2.72). His 147 strikeouts were tied with R.J. Gordon for second most, behind Jonah Tong (179). His 135.2 innings led the Mets’ minor league system. His 7.6 H/9 rate was eighth, behind Jonah Tong (4.6), Nolan McLean (6.2), Brendan Girton (6.3), Noah Hall (6.4), Will Watson (6.5), Brandon Sproat (7.2), and Jonathan Santucci (7.3). His 2.8 BB/9 rate was third, behind Joander Suarez (1.6), Irving Cota (2.1), and Joel Diaz (2.1). His 1.150 WHIP was fourth, behind Jonah Tong (0.924), Joander Suarez (1.050), and Nolan McLean (1.126).
In the Eastern League, his 2.92 ERA was fifth among starters who threw 75 innings or more, his 147 strikeouts were second (behind Jonah Tong, who remained the league leader with 162 Ks despite being promoted from Binghamton in mid-August), his H/9 rate eleventh, his BB/9 rate twelfth, and his WHIP was eighth.
Wenninger missed the Amazin’ Avenue Top 25 Prospect list for 2025, getting enough of the vote share to be ranked 28 if we extended the list further. I think that, given his performance this season, he will make it onto the future 2026 list, but I am not sure how high he will be ranked. In today’s day and age of advanced physical capture data and our ability to quantify things that, in the past, were left to gut feelings and the eyeball test, science and scouting have begin to morph into overlapping magisteria where a player is inadvertently penalized when one part of that formula is not as fleshed out as the other.
That is to say, two players may be otherwise completely identical in every single way possible, but the player who has more publicly-available data is going to be more highly regarded. Saying “Player A has a fastball that gets 20 inches of induced vertical break” sounds more authoritative than “Player B has a rising fastball that batters say is almost impossible to square up on,” and as such, we tend to give preference to Player A over Player B. Jack Wenninger, having played the entire season with the Binghamton Rumble Ponies, where publicly-available data is non-existent, falls into category B. That is not to say that I think Wenninger is severely underrated, but even looking back at 2024 prospect lists and overall opinions across the board, I immediately see this phenomenon in effect with a player who is about the came caliber prospect as Wenninger but got quite a bit more helium and ink spilled about him.
