Sean Manaea's rehab going at 'really good clip,' Frankie Montas progressing toward throwing

The Mets were dealt a handful of injuries to starting pitchers during spring training, with Paul Blackburn the latest to land on the injured list at Opening Day, but president of baseball operations David Stearns said on Wednesday that the club isn’t overly concerned about any of the injuries to the starters.

Stearns said that he’s experienced some spring trainings where you come out unscathed on the injury front and others where you "take it on the chin a little bit." 

“We’re fortunate that we believe that these dings to our starting rotation are pretty temporary and really not concerned with any of them,” he said from the Mets’ dugout in Houston ahead of Thursday's game against the Astros.

The Mets’ top baseball man said that Blackburn has already responded "really well" to the injection he got to deal with inflammation in his right knee, and Sean Manaea is “throwing and in good shape and really going through his rehab process at a really good clip and we’re excited about that.”

The Mets got the good news on Manaea two weeks ago when a follow-up MRI on his right oblique came back clear, and he was cleared to resume throwing as he was "symptom-free."

"We gotta pretty much build him back up as a starter," manager Carlos Mendozasaid at the time. "The good thing is he's feeling good, there's nothing going on there -- that oblique. And now it's just 75, 90, 120 [feet] before he gets on the mound."

Frankie Montas, who had had a “repeat MRI” on his lat injury in the last few days that showed “really good healing,” Stearns said.

In terms of throwing progression, the right-hander is still a “week or two away,” but Stearns was upbeat about Montas’ progress: “Clearly good healing is better than not healing and so we’ll certainly take that update.”

Montas landed on the shelf right at the start of spring training, which he believes he sustained during his first bullpen session of camp.

But on the whole, Stearns indicated a level of positivity on the rotation's injury issues on the eve of the season's start.

“At this point, we’re pretty optimistic on all these guys,” Stearns continued before dropping a grain of salt, “Of course, until they’re back throwing well in major league competition, we won’t know for sure. But we seem to be trending in the right direction and we’re really looking forward to getting them back.

“In the meantime, we have guys that we think can step up and do the job.”