Minor League Mondays: Matt Allan's Comeback Season Is Underway

There was a point not too long ago where Matt Allan was the pinnacle of the New York Mets' pitching plans. Former GM Brodie Van Wagenen made paying over slot for Allan the highlight of his 2019 draft, hoping to snag a talented high school pitcher to be a potential jewel of the rotation in the future. Arm injuries altered Allan's career path, but he has finally returned to the mound this season, making Allan the focus of this week's edition of Minor League Mondays.

Matt Allan is finally back on the mound after years of injury-related setbacks.

Allan's minor league journey began in 2019, when he made six appearances (including five starts) between the rookie-level Gulf Coast League Mets and Brooklyn (then Low-A). The COVID pandemic scuttled the minor league season in 2020, costing Allen a year of development, and then the arm injuries started to hit. Tommy John surgery came calling in 2021, followed by a nerve repositioning in 2022 and another Tommy John revision surgery in 2023.

The Mets wisely opted to slow play Allan's return to the mound, holding him out for the entire 2024 season before letting him get some work in during spring training. After emerging from the spring healthy, Allan was assigned to Low-A St. Lucie to start the campaign, where he went 0-2 with a 3.60 ERA in seven starts, striking out 17 batters in 15 innings pitched.

In Allan's early starts, his fastball was sitting at 97 miles per hour while his cutter was about six miles per hour slower. The cutter, along with a gyro slider, are new additions to his repertoire after work with the team's pitching lab, giving him five pitches to work with alongside his existing curve ball and changeup.

Strong early results for St. Lucie led the Mets to promote Allan to High-A Brooklyn, where he has pitched to a 3.60 ERA in four appearances (including two starts), striking out six batters in five innings pitched. The Mets have been very conservative with Allan's workload and he is currently on the 7-day injured list for the Cyclones, so expect the slow ramp up to resume once he is activated.

While the injuries and Allan's age (he is now 24) have knocked him out of the organization's Top 30 prospects according to MLB.com, the fact that Allan is pitching at all is a great story after all the adversity he has gone through. There is Rule V risk for Allan, who has been eligible for a bit, but it seems unlikely a team will take a shot on him given how far away he is from the majors and his extensive injury history.

Expect the Mets to let Allan spend the rest of this year in Brooklyn and slowly build up his workload over the course of the season. If Allan is able to get through the year healthy, the Mets would likely begin to build his innings between Brooklyn and AA Binghamton in 2026, with a long range goal of contention for a big league roster spot by the end of 2027. This isn't what the Mets had in mind when they took Allan six years ago, but the fact he is pitching at all after all of his arm injuries is a credit to Allan's resolve and determination to salvage his career.