Thor has to be hero to save Amazin’ year
WASHINGTON — At the least likely moment, their heels nudged right up against the abyss, the Mets have found their mojo. Michael Conforto’s swing is starting to produce lovely music again. Jose Reyes, left for dead about 72 hours earlier, looks like a reasonable facsimile of his old self again.
Hell, even Jeurys Familia had himself a 1-2-3 save to close out this 5-3 Mets win over the Nationals, clinching a most unexpected series victory, and it wasn’t like he ever has specialized in drama-free ninth innings, even at the peak of his powers.
On one level, this is precisely the kind of good news the Mets have been craving much of this season. They insisted they weren’t prone to panic, and they haven’t been. They swore even without Yoenis Cespedes for, you would think, at least the rest of the spring, they would figure out a way to get straight.
They did that. They got straight. They beat Max Scherzer on Friday night, they beat Stephen Strasburg on Saturday afternoon, and they got two homers from Conforto (including an eyeopening eighth-inning blast to the opposite field off a 99-mph heater from lefty Enny Romero) and 4 2/3 gritty innings out of Zack Wheeler.
This three-day state funeral already has turned into something else.
On Sunday, it can become something better.
Or it can all disappear in a heap. It really depends on one person.
It really depends on what we see out of Noah Sydergaard when he takes the mound in the bottom of the first inning after a week in which he a) claimed to have a traveling discomfort in his elbow/biceps/ shoulder; b) was skipped from his scheduled Thursday start; c) engaged in a loud clubhouse debate with Jay Horwitz, the Mets’ 71-year-old PR maven, who has taken decades worth of shrapnel on behalf of play- ers far more accomplished than Syndergaard; d) declared himself fit as a fiddle to start Sunday’s series finale.
On the surface, of course, that is good news. Of all the bad things that have befallen the Mets across the season’s first four weeks, nothing would be worse than an extended absence from Syndergaard. Everyone knows that. So when the Mets go conservative with him — limiting his pitches, limiting his innings, skipping him when necessary, forever erring on the side of caution — it is completely understandable.
Except there were these troubling words from general manager Sandy Alderson before Saturday’s game, when he mentioned the club would have preferred Syndergaard spend some time in an MRI tube this week, a move Syndergaard nixed:
“No, that’s not standard practice,” Alderson said. “But I can’t tie him down and throw him in the tube, either.”
That essentially is what Syndergaard said Friday night, too: “I think I know my body best,” he said. “I’m pretty in tune with my body, and that’s exactly why I refused to take the MRI.”
The basic question, of course, is this: Kid, are you hurting or not?
The fact is it was Sydergaard who caused the alarm bells to go off earlier this week by telling his bosses about his tired arm — which is exactly what he should have done — and who really got them clanking when he admitted, on the record, he couldn’t lift his arm over his head earlier in the week.
Hence the caution. Hence the desire for an MRI exam. Hence the frustration when Syndergaard said no.
“I had a little hiccup in my arm,” Syndergaard said.
When it comes to a pitcher’s arm there are hiccups all the time. Some stay hiccups. Some disappear. Some are a little more stubborn than that. There is no cure-all for this because if there were, teams gladly would pay a billion dollars to corner the market on preventative solutions.
So you do what you can. You try to be proactive. And the Mets, forever stung by criticism they don’t do enough right when their players get nicked and bruised, especially are sensitive about Syndergaard, their most prized possession.
They would like him to be, too.
Of course, the underlying issue will be there, as always: How does Noah look? How does he feel? How does he seem? Even an MRI exam wouldn’t cure that brand of anxiety.