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It is déjà vu in the worst way possible for one Mets reliever. 

Dedniel Núñez is headed back to the injured list with a right elbow sprain. 

The concern, according to manager Carlos Mendoza, is that this injury may require drastic measures to fix. 

“I think, you know, it’s [Tommy John surgery] on the table,” Mendoza said. 

While the Mets called the injury just an elbow sprain, Mendoza and president of baseball operations David Stearns confirmed that there is ligament damage in Núñez’s elbow. 

The reliever previously had Tommy John surgery in 2021 after spraining the UCL in his right elbow. 

Mendoza lamented Núñez’s situation given his injury history. 

“You feel for the kid; you feel for the athlete,” Mendoza said. “He was huge for us last year, and you started seeing some of those signs again with the way he was throwing the baseball.” 

Núñez has had to work hard to return from his first Tommy John surgery. Just before his injury, he was selected in the Rule 5 draft by the Giants off the Mets’ roster in 2021. 

However, his time with San Francisco was short-lived, and he returned to the Mets that November. 

Before his surgery, he was primarily being trained as a starting pitcher, but his trajectory changed. 

When he returned to the mound in 2022, he was used only as a reliever in Double-A and Triple-A. He pitched in 66 games in the minors between 2022 and 2023. 

In 2024, he was selected for the 40-man roster. He was promoted to the major leagues for the first time in his career April 9, 2024. But last July, he was placed on the 15-day IL for a pronator sprain in his right forearm. 

That injury did not slow him down, and he returned in August looking good. He appeared in 25 games, posting a 2.31 ERA and a 0.91 WHIP. 

But the injury bug bit again in September in the form of a flexor injury.

He received platelet-rich plasma injections to avoid surgery, which worked at the time. 

This time, he may not be so lucky, and his return timetable is unknown.