Mets Minor League Players of the Week: Week Five

Austin Channing

**Week: 2 G (2 GS), 9.1 IP, 5 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 4 BB, 11 K (High-A)** **2026 Season: 4 G (4 GS), 16.2 IP, 10 H, 4 R, 3 ER (1.62 ERA), 13 BB, 18 K, .225 BABIP (High-A)** Channing Austin was signed by the Mets as an undrafted free agent in July 2024. A born-and-raised Brooklynite, Austin attended Poly Prep in Dyker Heights, where he was a four-year letterwinner and two-year captain at the prestigious institution. Primarily an infielder, he helped lead the Blue Devils to NYSAIS in 2017 and 2018, received All-League honors in 2019, and was named to Poly Prep’s All-Decade Team. Like many who graduated high school in 2020, Austin went undrafted in the COVID-shortened 2020 MLB Draft and honored his commitment to the University of Virginia. The 19-year-old did not play much in 2021. Head coach Brian O’Connor had Austin- now focusing exclusively on pitcher- pitch in two games in relief, and to make matters worse, the right-hander did not exactly impress in those two games, allowing three runs while recording just a single out, walking two batters, hitting a batter, and throwing two wild pitches. He supplemented his time on the field by playing for the Martha’s Vineyard Sharks of the New England Collegiate Baseball League and entered the NCAA Transfer Portal, looking to switch to a program that would allow him to play more. Austin transferred to the University of Southern California, but once again, he got very little playing time. In his first year with the Trojans, the right-hander appeared in two games, and once again struggled. Recording just two outs over his two innings of work, Austin allowed four runs- two earned- on four walks and a wild pitch. That summer, he once again supplemented his playing time with time on the mound on summer collegiate leagues, this time with the New York Phenoms of the Atlantic Collegiate League and the Chatham Anglers of the Cape Cod Baseball League. While it’s hard to pitch less than what Austin did in 2021 with Virginia and 2022 with USC, the right-hander accomplished that in 2023: an injury prevented him from playing altogether in 2023. He returned to the mound in 2024, his redshirt junior season, and made 14 appearances on the mound, posting a 6.28 ERA in 14.1 innings, allowing 16 hits, walking 15, and striking out 17. Eligible for the 2024 MLB Draft, he went unsigned; seeking to showcase himself to major league ballclubs, he played in the MLB Draft League that summer. Appearing in 8 games for the Trenton Thunder, Austin posted a 3.00 ERA in 15.0 innings, allowing 11 hits, walking 5, and striking out 16. Based on his performance there, the Mets signed him as an undrafted free agent at the end of July. He was assigned to the Single-A St. Lucie Mets and made a single appearance over the rest of the summer, allowing a hit, walking a batter, and striking out a batter in 1.1 innings of work. He returned to the St. Lucie Mets when the 2025 season began and spent the majority of the year with them. Making 11 starts and appearing in 20 games total, the right-hander posted a 4.31 ERA in 71.0 innings, allowing 67 hits, walking 43, and striking out 66. At the end of the season, he was promoted to High-A Brooklyn, where he made a single regular season start and then threw a bit during Brooklyn’s playoff run. He remained in Brooklyn to begin the 2026 season and the hometown boy has been benefitting from off-season work coupled with the South Atlantic League run environment, currently possessing the best ERA in the league among qualified starting pitchers. Austin throws from a high-three-quarters arm slot with a long arm circle through the back. The right-hander has a standard repertoire, throwing a four-seam fastball, changeup, gyroscopic slider, and curveball. Generally speaking, he throws his fastball roughly 50% of the time, and then evenly mixes in his secondary pitches, going a bit more heavy on his slider than his changeup or curve. Austin’s fastball can top out at 97, 98 MPH but generally sitting in the mid-90s, sitting in the low-to-mid-90s. The pitch has shown above-average spin rates, and because of how that spin activates, his fastball shows above-average induced vertical break. His command of the pitch is not great, and while batters haven’t done much damage against the pitch, the right-hander has too often set himself up to fail by not establishing the fastball. His curveball sits in the low-to-mid-80s and features slight 1-7 break. His slider sits in the same velocity band, averaging a higher range within that band and has sharper movement. Depending on the day and his feel for the pitches, either can be Austin’s most effective strikeout pitch. Over the 2025 offseason, he has been working on commanding both pitches better, throwing more in the zone. His changeup has been his least effective secondary pitch, sitting in the mid-to-high-80s. The pitch does not have much velocity differential as compared to his fastball and does not have much vertical or horizontal movement to it. When he can locate the pitch on the edges of the plate, it can get some whiffs, but in the zone, when batters make contact with it, it generally has not fared well.

**Players of the Week 2026**

Week One/Two (March 27-April 5): Hayden Senger/Cam Tilly

Week Three (April 7-April 12): A.J. Ewing/Christian Scott

Week Four (April 14-April 18): Randy Guzman/Jose Chirinos