stinky colon wrecked at wrigley
Playoff hopes dim as Mets, Colon decked by Cubs
CHICAGO — The whole premise of the Mets making a playoff push is predicated upon starting pitching. And right now there is legitimate concern within the organization if the Mets have enough.
A potentially inconsistent Logan Verrett every fifth day is one thing, but the Mets desperately need 43-year-old Bartolo Colon, and lately he has veered sharply from the pitcher who was among the team’s top performers in the first half.
But don’t expect Colon, even if he’s wilting in the summer heat, to receive a hiatus anytime soon.
“We have no other options right now,” manager Terry Collins said after Colon surrendered two home runs to Anthony Rizzo in the Mets’ 6-2 loss to the Cubs at Wrigley Field on Wednesday. “Right now, if he was 53, he would be out there pitching.”
Matt Harvey’s season-ending surgery for thoracic outlet syndrome has left a fragile rotation even thinner, as the Mets deal with bone spurs that have affected Steven Matz and Noah Syndergaard. Another talented young pitcher, Zack Wheeler, has suffered two setbacks this season in his rehab from Tommy John surgery and may not rejoin the team until mid-to-late August.
Team brass continues to search for a reliever heading into the Aug. 1 non-waiver trade deadline, but has the belief that dealing for another quality starter might not be practical given the organization’s dearth of top-level prospects after last summer’s trade spree.
All that has left Colon as a valuable component who can’t be skipped a turn or even pushed back in the rotation.
“We don’ t have the animals for it right now,” Collins sai d. “You worry about Matz, worry about Syndergaard, we’ve got Logan Verrett pushed in the rotation, now we’ve got Bart — you only can get so many guys, and right now with Harvey being down and what our options are right now, you bring up a guy and now all of a sudden your bullpen is short.
“There’s lot of dynamics that go into all of a sudden thinking you need more pitching. As we’ve said before, you never have enough pitching. Ever. This year we’ve got to ride out what we’ve got, and they’ve got to step up and hopefully start pitching well as a group.”
The Mets fell to 3-3 since the All-Star break and will begin an important series Friday in Miami, following the Thursday off day.
Awaiting will be the Marlins, who have a one-game lead on the Mets for the NL’s second wild-card spot after Wednesday’s 4-1 loss at Philadelphia.
In his shortest start of the season, Colon (8-5) went just 4 1/ innings and allowed
3 six earned runs on eight hits with two walks. The righty now has gone three straight starts without completing six innings, and in two of those appearances he allowed six runs. Along the way, his ERA has surged from 2.87 toto 33.48. “I think mentally I wasn’t all there today, and I paid the consequences,” Colon said.
Rizzo’s two-run bomb in the fifth — his second hom- er of the game — put the Mets in a 5-0 hole. Kris Bryant had doubled leading off the inning before Rizzo hit a no-doubter into the rightfield bleachers for his 24th homer of the season.
Rizzo’s solo homer in the third (also a no-doubter) had extended the Cubs’ lead to 3-0. Overall, the lefty slugger hit three homers in the series.
Colon’s day started roughly, with successive walks in the first inning to load the bases before Addison Russell delivered a two-run double. Bryant had singled earlier in the inning and stole second against a maybe still woozy Travis d’Arnaud, who was drilled by a foul tip in the groin area.
The Mets got their runs in the eighth with Wilmer Flores’ two-run homer against Travis Wood. The blast was
Flores’ ninth in 38 games since June 3 and gave him 25 RBIs over that stretch.