Harvey has his agenda, Mets theirs
Down in the trenches in those old war movies, there would be issues of morale. Somebody got scared, or couldn’t open fire, or was secretly working for the other side, and the message was always the same: It just takes one person to screw up group chemistry in a crisis.
Baseball has nothing to do with warfare, but that one element holds true. You realize that if you’ve been following Matt Harvey’s saga with the New York Mets.
On Sunday, he was that forlorn-looking figure in the Mets’ dugout, sitting by himself, knowing his teammates were disgusted. He had just pitched five one-hit innings against the Yankees, reaching 95 mph on the radar gun, but wait — innings limit! Meddling agent Scott Boras! Nervous general manager Sandy Alderson! Get Harvey out of there!
As Harvey came off rehabilitation from Tommy John surgery, Boras consulted with doctors and concluded that his client should pitch no more than 180 innings this season. He couldn’t prove this theory; like everyone else in the history of baseball, he was totally guessing — just as he did when he idiotically steered the Washington Nationals into shutting down Stephen Strasburg three years ago.
Harvey and Alderson each bought into the plan, but now the Mets are playoff-bound and in great need of their onetime ace. They want him to pitch, but only a few innings at a time. Those five innings placed him at 1762⁄3, he was removed, and the Yankees tore into the Mets’ bullpen for an 11-2 win.
“The whole thing is totally asinine,” former pitching coach Leo Mazzone told USA Today. Equally furious was Mets manager Terry Collins, who told reporters, “If this stuff keeps us from winning the pennant, I’m not going to be happy about it.”
The Mets have said nothing definitive about their upcoming strategy. Harvey, whose next start comes Saturday in Cincinnati, wants to be a postseason mainstay but he’s not discounting the long-term plan, either. And the players, many of them playing through injuries, see a guy with a separate agenda. Nobody’s friend in the trenches.