AREN’T JAKE
Lat muscle injury
Collins said. “So he needs a little more of a full pen to make a determination of where he is at.”
The Mets have been looking for answers with deGrom most of the spring. He has been plagued with nagging injuries, including a tight groin muscle and tightness in his lower back that cost him time in spring training.
More alarming, however, has been deGrom’s velocity, which has dropped significantly since last season.
DeGrom’s fastball was markedly slower this spring and in his only start of the season. The 27-year-old had an average four-seam fastball speed of almost 96 miles per hour last year, according to Brooks Baseball. In his first start of the season, deGrom’s fastball averaged just over 92 miles per hour. His slider, which he threw at an average of just under 90 mph last season, was averaging just under 87 miles per hour this year.
“He’s gotten outs, he knows how to pitch,” one scout who saw him this spring said, “but that electric ‘stuff’ just isn’t there now.”
DeGrom has been known to wear down. The Mets forced him to skip a start at the end of the regular season in 2015 because he was tired and they felt he was battling fatigue in his only World Series start, allowing four runs on six hits in five innings.
This is an alarming start for the Mets and their only 2015 All-Star.
The Mets have their entire season hopes built on their pitching, the dominating four young starters who helped them get to the World Series last season. They also had concerns about the young pitchers suffering a “hangover” from a heavy workload last season. DeGrom threw 216 innings in 2015, well above the 187 he threw in 2014. That was one reason the Mets brought back Bartolo Colon, hoping to build some pitching depth to protect themselves.
The 42-year-old veteran who started Friday night is not just a spot holder in the rotation until Zack Wheeler, the fifth of those highly touted young arms, returns from his Tommy John rehab in mid-June or July. Colon is also veteran insurance against injuries to any of the other starters and then a possible long man in the bullpen.
One thing is for certain: The Mets are relying more on Colon and Verrett than they had planned. PHOTO BY AP