Could Carson Benge Be the Mets’ Next Game-Changer in 2026?

Growing up in the heart of Yukon, Oklahoma, Carson Benge was nothing short of a baseball prodigy shadowing his two elder brothers Garrett and Tyler on every field they could find. It’s fascinating, really—while Garrett carved out his own path through Cowley Community College and then Oklahoma State, carrying dreams into the MLB Draft only to delay the leap, and Tyler made his mark at Southwestern Oklahoma State University, it’s the youngest, Carson, who’s steadily grabbing the spotlight with a blend of raw talent and an unyielding passion that promises a dazzling future. There’s something magnetic about his story — the sibling rivalry, the shared dream, and that unmistakable aura of potential that separates him from the pack. I can’t help but feel drawn to how his journey unfurled: a tall, lanky freshman at Yukon High whose swing evolved from wild child to powerful left-handed weapon despite the roadblocks thrown by a pandemic and injury.

Carson’s commitment to Oklahoma State was no mere footnote; it was a pivotal choice that saw him forgo the 2021 draft to hone his skills, only to face the setback of Tommy John surgery. Yet, like a true competitor, he didn’t just bounce back — he exploded onto the scene, showcasing a rare two-way prowess that’s earned him accolades and caught the eyes of every scout with a pulse. The New York Mets’ first-round pick in 2024, Benge swiftly transitioned to professional play, where his bat speed, strike zone savvy, and evolving mechanics started turning heads from Low-A St. Lucie all the way to Triple-A Syracuse. Though a rocky stretch in Syracuse challenged him, his overall debut season was nothing short of electric — blending steady contact with flashes of raw power, and highlighting areas ripe for growth.

What really hooks me, beyond the stats and highlight reels, is Carson’s calculated approach at the plate — a lightning-quick lefty swing that’s margin-for-error tight and yet impressively adaptable, mixing a healthy dose of opposite-field hitting with an appetite for learning and growth. He’s got a frame that’s lean but nimble, defense that’s reliable, and a knack for reading plays that bodes well if he’s to command center field long term — though his right-field arm certainly adds polish to his defensive résumé. Aware of his platoon splits and the challenge left-handers pose, Benge remains an enigma in progress, a diamond in the rough sharpening his claws as the Mets’ third-best prospect heading into 2025. There’s no doubt in my mind, his story is only just beginning — and it’s shaping up to be one heck of a ride.

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Carson Benge grew up with two older brothers, Garrett and Tyler. All four grew up baseball rats and were mainstays on the fields across their native Yukon, Oklahoma. Garrett went on to attend Cowley Community College in Arkansas City, Kansas in 2015, was drafted by the Cleveland Indians with their 22nd round pick in the 2015 MLB Draft, did not sign and attended Oklahoma State University in 2016 and 2017, was then drafted by the Boston Red Sox in the 13th round of the 2017 MLB Draft, playing in their system for three years. Tyler attended Southwestern Oklahoma State University in Weatherford, Oklahoma and played at the collegiate level for a pair of seasons. Youngest brother Carson may have the most potential and brightest future of the three.

Overview

Name: Carson Benge
Position: OF
Born: 01/20/2003 (Age 23 season in 2026)
Height: 6’1”
Weight: 185 lbs.
Bats/Throws: L/R
Acquired: 2024 MLB Draft, 1st Round (Oklahoma State University)
2025 Stats: 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, 3 HR, 9 BB, 19 K, 3/3 SB, .188 BABIP (Triple-A)

From an early age, Carson was dedicated to baseball, following along in the footsteps of his older brothers. He would use his brothers’ equipment and would play with his brothers and their friends, who were anywhere between three to five years older than him. By the time he began his freshman year at Yukon High School, a growth spurt had left him a tall, lanky young man, and his wild, childhood swing had been refined into a powerful left-handed stroke. Benge had much of his high school baseball experience muddied by the COVID-19 pandemic, with his entire junior season cancelled and parts of his senior year as well, but he put up impressive numbers when he was able to get on the field. In his senior year, he was named OCABCA North Player of the Year and earned COAC Offensive Player of the Year honors as well, as a senior in 2021, hitting .490 and posting an 8-1 record with 124 strikeouts on the mound.

Benge had previously committed to Oklahoma State University prior to graduating and went unselected in the 2021 MLB Draft as a result, strongly preferring to attend college as opposed to going pro early. His freshman season winded up ending before it even began, as he injured his elbow just prior to the start of the 2022 season and needed Tommy John surgery to correct, costing him the year. He returned to the field in 2023, his redshirt freshman season, and immediately showed that he was a premium talent. Appearing in 59 games, Benge hit .345/.468/.538 with 17 doubles, 7 home runs, 8 stolen bases in 10 attempts, and drew 42 walks to 32 strikeouts, his batting average and on-base percentage leading the team. Additionally, he pitched 35.0 innings for the Cowboys and posted a 6.69 ERA with 38 hits allowed, 24 walks, and 35 strikeouts. Benge was named to the Big 12 All-Freshman Team, the All-Big 12 First Team as a utility player, and the All-Big 12 Second Team as an outfielder. He was also finalist for the John Olerud Two-Way Player of the Year Award, but the award ultimately went to Clemson senior Caden Grice.

That summer, he played for the Chatham Anglers of the Cape Cod Collegiate Baseball League. He appeared in 9 games and hit .345/.424/.414 with 1 triple and threw a scoreless inning on the mound, giving up a hit while striking out two. He returned to OSU for his redshirt sophomore season in 2024 and once again was a true two-way player. As a batter, he hit .335/.444/.665 in 61 games with 24 doubles, 2 triples, 18 home runs, 10 stolen bases in 14 attempts, and 49 walks to 51 strikeouts. As a pitcher, he appeared in 18 games and posted a 3.16 ERA in 37.0 innings, allowing 26 hits, walking 11, and striking out 44. Once again, he was a finalist for the John Olerud Two-Way Player of the Year Award but lost out on it for a second consecutive year, this time to University of Florida star Jac Caglianone.

Benge was selected by the Mets with their first-round selection in the 2024 MLB Draft, the 19th overall pick. Coming into the season, he had been seen as a player who would be selected in the back-half of the first round by most evaluators and analysts, and with the Mets’ selection, their prediction came to pass. Benge signed with the team fairly quickly, agreeing to a signing bonus worth $3,997,500, slightly below the MLB-assigned slot value for the 19th overall pick, $4,219,200. He was assigned to the Low-A St. Lucie Mets, where he would be focusing only on hitting. He appeared in 15 games and hit .273/.420/.436 with 2 doubles, 2 home runs, 3 stolen bases, and 11 walks to 14 strikeouts. On the power of his college season and his limited professional debut, Benge was ranked the Mets’ 3rd top prospect for the 2025 season by Amazin’ Avenue.

The outfielder began the 2025 season with the High-A Brooklyn Cyclones and had one of the better seasons by any player in a Cyclones uniform, short-season or full. Appearing in 60 games, he hit .302/.417/.480 with 18 doubles, 5 triples, 4 home runs, 15 stolen bases in 17 attempts, and drew 41 walks to 50 strikeouts. The Mets promoted Benge to Double-A Binghamton at the end of June, and he showed no signed of being overwhelmed by the tougher competition; in fact, Benge was better. In the 32 games he ended up playing in Binghamton, he hit .317/.407/.571 with 6 doubles, 1 triple, 8 home runs, 4 stolen bases in 8 attempts, and drew 18 walks to 23 strikeouts. In mid-August, Benge was promoted to Triple-A Syracuse. His time there got off to a rough start, as he was placed on the injured list a few days later for an undisclosed injury, but when he got back on the field at the end of the month, he really couldn’t get going. He ended up appearing in 24 games for Syracuse and hit .178/.272/.311 with 1 double, 1 triple, 3 home runs, 3 stolen bases in as many attempts, and drew 9 walks to 19 strikeouts. Overall, it was an incredible season for the outfielder, and he hit a combined .281/.385/.472 with 25 doubles, 7 triples, 15 home runs, 22 stolen bases in 26 attempts, and drew 68 walks to 92 strikeouts.

In college, Benge had mechanics at the plate that could have been regarded as yellow flags based on the history of being problematic in a professional wood bat setting. The 6’1”, 185-pound left-hander stood extremely open, holding his hands high behind his head and wrapping his bat behind his head at 10:00. As he would load up, he would raise his hands and angle his bat parallel to the ground before lowering them and angling his bat perpendicular to the ground at 12:00 before returning it back to its original position during his front leg strike and swing, sometimes with compensatory bat wiggle. At some point during his 2024 season with the Cowboys, the hand movement during his load became less pronounced and he got them back into hitting position much quicker, with most of the extra movement and momentum removed. As evidenced by his solid 2024 professional debut with St. Lucie and his strong 2025 season with Brooklyn, Binghamton, and Syracuse, his modified mechanics have been effective with a wood bat in a professional setting.

The left-hander has a lightning-fast bat that stays in the zone and makes a lot of quality contact because of a strong sense of the strike zone and an advanced eye for spin. His cumulative 42.4% Swing% and 8.1% SwingStr% were just under the 2025 MLB averages, while his 80.9% Contact% was just a little over it. When he makes solid contact on pitches and hits them squarely, he has produced exit velocities over 110 MPH as per publicly available statcast data with Syracuse. While he does hit the ball hard, Benge still needs to work on improving the damage that he does with those balls.

In his last year in college, Benge focused on hitting the ball in the air more and tapping into more of his power. He was more or less successful in doing so, running a 15% line drive rate, 46.5% groundball rate, and a 38.5% flyball rate in his last year with the Cowboys, as opposed to his 18.1% line drive rate, 53% groundball rate, and 28.9% flyball rate the year before. In 2025, the outfielder had a 24.7% line drive rate, 42.5% groundball rate, and 31.4% flyball rate, specifically with an 8.3% pulled fastball rate. Benge posted a suboptimal median launch angle of less than 10-degrees in 2024, and in 2025 averaged a 9-degree launch angle during his time in Syracuse, where publicly available statcast data exists. Lifting the ball more will unlock more of Benge’s natural power and continues to be his main area of improvement.

Because of his swing’s length, Benge naturally goes to the opposite field, shooting pitches middle or away to left-center. In totality in 2025, he pulled the ball at a 39.1% rate, went back up the middle at a 22% rate, and went to the opposite field at a 38.9% rate. His swing showed platoon splits at Oklahoma State, highlighting a weaknesses against left-handers, and while they did not manifest themselves in his brief professional debut in 2024, they reared their heads in 2025. Against right-handers, Benge hit .295/.379/.512, but against left-handers, he hit .232/.407/.326. He can be a pesky at-bat for southpaw pitchers, since he has a natural feel for going the other way, but pitches inside have been a problem for Benge, with a best case scenario of inside-outing balls that dunk in for hits instead of getting jammed.

Defensively, the wiry outfielder generally gets good reads off the bat, takes efficient routes to the ball, and has solid range thanks to his average-to-above-average speed. He does not have a dynamic first step or the afterburners that true above-average runners have, but he reaches his reaches his striding speed quickly and can cover plenty of ground. When he was drafted, scouts and evaluators were split on whether or not he had enough range to play centerfield in the long term. The slim, athletically built Benge has demonstrated that he has enough speed and range to play the position in the near long term, with future mass addition and how it develops on his body being the true deciding factor. In a corner, he has a plus arm and profiles well in right field as a result.

2026 Mets Top 25 Prospect List

3) Jonah Tong
4) Jett Williams*
5) Brandon Sproat*
6) A.J. Ewing
7) Jacob Reimer
8) Ryan Clifford
9) Will Watson
10) Jack Wenninger
11) Mitch Voit
12) Jonathan Santucci
13) Elian Peña
14) Zach Thornton
15) Nick Morabito
16) R.J. Gordon
17) Chris Suero
18) Dylan Ross
19) Ryan Lambert
20) Antonio Jimenez
21) Edward Lantigua
22) Eli Serrano III
23) Randy Guzman
24) Daiverson Gutierrez
25) Boston Baro