THAT SINKS!
Gsellman’s best pitch won’t drop while Met bats flop in loss to Fish:
Robert Gsellman’s sinker wasn’t sinking. Maybe it was the cold, windy night, or maybe he was over-amped in his first start of the season, and thus overthrowing. Whatever the reason, Gsellman was throwing 93 mph two-seamers at the belt that were begging to be put into orbit, and the Marlins were doing a fair job of obliging, hitting rockets all over Citi Field.
In fact, if you were only looking at the exit velocity numbers off the bat, you would have guessed that Gsellman didn’t fare much better than Jeremy Guthrie, the Nationals’ starter who gave up 10 runs and failed to get out of the first inning in Philadelphia on Saturday night.
Instead, when all was said and done, Mets’ No. 5 starter managed to get through five innings while allowing only three of the nine Marlins who reached base to score.
In other words, Gsellman showed some toughness on this night, refusing to let a bad start get out of control, even re-inventing himself a bit to survive, getting big outs to limit the damage on curve balls and changeups rather than his go-to sinker.
All of which may prove to be more significant than anything else that happened in an otherwise dreary 8-1 loss to the Marlins.
Yes, a week into the season the Mets are in one of those team-wide funks at the plate to which their home run-oriented offense has been so susceptible the last couple of years, even during backto-back playoff seasons.
But they’ve also proven by now that they’ll string together a lot of wins when their bats get hot, so it’s silly to overreact to their early struggles.
Not that Terry Collins is thrilled with a 2-3 start at home against the Braves and the Marlins.
After all, it’s more evidence the Mets are what they are offensively, even after a spring in which Collins emphasized the importance of doing the little things, moving runners over with productive outs, improving their two-strike approach to get some singles with runners in scoring position.
It’s hard to believe the Mets will again be the worst team in the National League hitting with runners in scoring position, as they were last season, hitting .225 in those situations.
But they probably won’t be dramatically better, either.
On the other hand, their power will make for fireworks shows some nights, but enough dry spells to test the patience of a fan base with championship expectations. How well the Mets’ pitching weathers those dry spells likely will dictate whether this team can win more games than the Nationals in the NL East.
All in all, even hard markers have to feel good about the Mets’ starting pitching after one spin through the rotation _ assuming they’ll go deeper into games as the get make more starts, that is.
Otherwise Noah Syndergaard and Jacob deGrom delivered brilliance; Matt Harvey commanded all of his pitches impressively; Zack Wheeler showed high-ceiling stuff despite predictable rust after a two-year layoff; and then there was Gsellman.
He could turn out to be an X-factor for this rotation, making it exceptionally deep if he lives up to the praise Terry Collins has been showering him with for weeks.
“He doesn’t throw maybe as hard as Noah but he kind of reminds me of deGrom,’’ Collins said before Saturday’s game. “That two-seamer…hitters beat it into the ground, and he’s got two other quality pitches.
“You break this guy down pitch for pitch, he’s got as much quality stuff as anybody on the staff.”
Maybe Collins is overselling Gsellman a bit but he clearly believes in him, and in a strange way, the righthander showed why on Saturday night.
Nope, he didn’t have his sinker, but he hung tough enough to make an impression. By the fifth inning he was running out of gas after so many high-stress jams, and the Marlins put runners at first and third with one out, already leading 3-1, with the middle of their lineup at the plate.
Yet Gsellman used a changeup against lefty-hitting Justin Bour to set up a 93-mph sinker that he ran to the outside corner, getting a weak ground ball to third. And then, facing Marcell Ozuna, who had homered in the second inning, Gsellman fooled him with a 1-1 curve ball, then struck him out with an 85-mph changeup to end the inning.
Afterward Gsellman said his mechanics were out of whack early, perhaps because of the firststart adrenaline, but figured it out after the third inning, allowing him to at least survive five innings.
At that point he was done after 91 pitches, so, no, it wasn’t an efficient outing but it was sure a gutsy one.
“He didn’t have his sinker, but he competes, let me tell you,’’ Collins said. “He’s got quality stuff and he’s going to be here a long time.”
On an otherwise forgettable night for the Mets, that might just be worth remembering.