Milone, Smoker among Saturday starter options
The Mets could put names in a hat and draw one. That’s if throwing at a dartboard doesn’t produce a starting pitcher’s name for Saturday.
For now, manager Terry Collins said, the plan is to stick with Tommy Milone, despite the lefthander getting torched in his most recent outing: 1 ¹/3 innings, eight runs and three homers allowed Sunday against the Angels.
The Mets have other options. There’s Josh Smoker who was summoned from Triple-A Las Vegas on Tuesday when Hansel Robles was sent down. There’s Tyler Pill, the finesse, pitch-to-contact guy who has succeeded at Double- and Triple-A this season. Still, Milone is the front-runner.
“Right now, Tom is scheduled to pitch Saturday,” Collins said Tuesday before the Mets started a threegame series with the Padres at Citi Field. “We’ll see what occurs between now and then. Again, we don’t know when those other guys may be ready.”
Those “other guys” are Steven Matz and Seth Lugo, both of whom made minor league rehab starts Tuesday. Matz threw 78 pitches over four innings for Triple-A Las Vegas, allowing five runs on five hits, including two homers. Lugo, meanwhile, started for Single-A St. Lucie and gave up seven runs (six earned) over four innings and 62 pitches.
“Certainly when they are [ready], we’re going to try to get them up here and get them in the rotation, but I don’t know when that date is and when they might be ready,” Collins said.
The optimistic expectation is both Matz and Lugo make an additional start and rejoin the Mets late next week. The Mets’ rotation has been a nightmare this season with Noah Syndergaard suffering a partially torn lat and Jacob deGrom and Matt Harvey both returning from 2016 surgeries.
So it’s Milone on Saturday, subject to change — the Mets want to see how he looks in a bullpen session. Smoker, the lefty reliever, went to Las Vegas and made two starts in order to get stretched out and work on his slider and changeup. In 8 2/3 innings, he allowed one earned run and struck out eight.
“Getting more consistent,” Smoker said of the goal for his sec- ondary pitches. “There were times here I was getting a little lazy and just didn’t have the spin the way I wanted it to. So getting down there and getting some consecutive innings in where it wasn’t just one inning at a time was really good in helping with getting it down in the bottom part of the zone.”
Smoker pitched an inning of relief in Tuesday’s win, giving up a solo home run and striking out two batters.