Wheels keep turning for forgotten pitcher
PORT ST. LUCIE — The ball comes out of his hand so easily. That is so great for Zack Wheeler. Yet, in some ways, that is the problem: That the ball is coming out of his hand so easily. “Effortless with explosion” was how Travis d’Arnaud described a recent bullpen session.
“Just look at his body language,” J.P. Ricciardi, the Mets’ special assistant to the general manager, said while watching another recent pen session. “He is up on the mound pitching, not stretching out his arm between pitches. His body language is that of a healthy pitcher going about his business, and the full extension is a sign he is holding nothing back.”
Yep, after yet another setback earlier in camp, Wheeler is again throwing with explosion and positive body language and promise of what can be. And only knowing the history — his with injury and the Mets in dealing with Matt Harvey’s comeback — could make promise ebb to problem. How do you calibrate a starter returning from Tommy John surgery who best helps the team without mentally or physically losing the pitcher?
“I try to keep my hopes down,” Wheeler said. “Because they were up before and shot down.”
Next Thursday will mark the two-year anniversary of Wheeler’s elbow ligament tearing in a spring game against the Marlins. Next Friday he is scheduled to pitch as part of Mets split squad in Lake Buena Vista, Fla., against the Braves. In the 24 months in between, Wheeler faced one batter at High-A last year. His rehab started and stopped often in 2016, one arm issue after another pushing the carrot beyond his grasp.
Which is why Wheeler is trying not to dance with optimism or even delve deeply into questions about how he will be used and when. It is why pitching coach Dan Warthen said “not yet” when asked if a plan has been formulated on how Wheeler will be deployed in 2017.
“Let’s just try to get him ready to pitch in a game first,” Warthen said.
But this is the time to dream, isn’t it? Spring training? Best scenarios? For the Mets, the organizational high hopes revolve around the quality of their rotation Big Four, which was unwrapped Friday with Noah Syndergaard — flying hair, burning fastball — working his first two innings of spring. The 2017 debuts of Jacob deGrom, Harvey and Steven Matz follow the next three days.
The hope was always to be a Big Five, Wheeler joining the band. And we are on the brink again. And yet … it is not just that Wheeler has become way more familiar with MRI than ERA, elbow tenderness already slowing his progression this spring. It is that even fully healthy Wheeler will have roughly a 120-inning maximum, and how exactly do the Mets maximize that?
In 2015, the Mets had about 180 innings in mind for Harvey, and his powerful agent, Scott Boras, certainly did not want his client exceeding that in the year after Tommy John surgery. I always thought the Mets should have pushed the start of Harvey’s season back to the start of May, or even May 15, and have him the rest of the way, especially because they had a realistic chance at October, as they do again in 2017.
I feel similarly about Wheeler. The Mets are discussing whether to use Wheeler as a first-half reliever to save innings for a second-half rotation spot or to have him in the rotation from the outset, use his 120 innings and shut him down afterward. But I would try to keep him in extended spring until around June 1 and then have him for the most precious part of the schedule, perhaps even a Division Series Game 4 start. Again, if you are not going to dream big now, then when?
Robert Gsellman and Seth Lugo emerged in 2016 and either can fill the fifth-starter spot for now. In fact, Warthen cautioned that even a healthy Wheeler “has to earn that job again. Having the big arm does not give him carte blanche.”
This is obviously imperfect. Wheeler could be held to June and then get hurt and not even get near the 120 innings, putting him back in a similar spot next year. Also, what is best for the team could just be torture for Wheeler, in this case telling a healthy starter to stay behind in Port St. Lucie for a third straight year, letting yet another season start without him while he debates Chili’s versus Panera Bread for dinner. “I know I only have a certain number of innings, which is low,” Wheeler said. “It is up to them how they will be used. I just want to be healthy.” That is the first baby step. Just health. But with health — with that ball exploding out of his hand — will come the difficult math of how to maximize 120 innings. joel.sherman@nypost.com