METS WOES ON THE BUMP
Matt Harvey blew his elbow out and required Tommy John surgery.
Zack Wheeler blew his elbow out and required Tommy John surgery.
Noah Syndergaard had his elbow recently checked out by doctors.
Steven Matz will have his next start skipped with an elbow issue.
While he doesn’t have elbow issues per se, it should also be noted that Jacob deGrom has seen a velocity decrease of more than two mph this season on his fastball.
Something is rotten in New York folks.
A little over two weeks ago I wrote a piece about Noah Syndergaard entitled Can it Last? In that piece I referenced the work of Tom Verducci who pointed out some interesting/alarming data with Mets hurlers, specifically Syndergaard. Some info from that piece.
“Physical freaks come along once a generation,” said one rival general manager. “He’s either that or this is not sustainable. The odds tell you that it’s not sustainable.”
"Ask any baseball person,” the GM said, “and the kind of torque it takes to spin a slider is what concerns you. It’s not a cutter. Arrieta throws a cutter with how he lets it come off his fingers. This is a true slider, with more depth than a cutter.”
Now we hear that a couple weeks back, about when Verducci and I were writing our articles, Syndergaard was visiting a doctor for his elbow. Yikes.
Verducci also went on to record that the men who have thrown the hardest slider in baseball the last three years, and this season. are ALL Mets.
2013: Matt Harvey
2014: Zack Wheeler
2015: Harvey/deGrom
2016: Noah Syndergaard
How many of those guys have had arm issues again?
Let’s move on to Matz, the most recent concern.
Matz is dealing with upper forearm soreness in the area of his elbow. It seems likely that he will have an MRI, and no one seems overly concerned. But…
"It was enough concern for me to say something to the trainers," Matz said. "It was just sore, so I said something… last year, I tried to push through it and ended up missing two months. It's better to play it safe and give it the rest when I need it."
Let us not forget that Matz has already had Tommy John surgery, back in 2010, and he’s dealt with all kinds of health issues since that time causing much consternation. For now, he will take anti-inflammatory medication, skip a start, and hope that is the end of it (Logan Verrett will make will start Saturday at Coors Field). Kinda doubt it is.
I don’t know. Maybe it’s all coincidence, but the fact is that every young arm the Mets have seems to have issues with the elbow, likely the result of throwing the slider. Alas, the slider is why so many of the young arms have had success.
MINOR LEAGUE UPDATES
I wrote about Byron Buxton yesterday in the Mailbag.
Lucas Giolito is struggling. In six starts at Double-A, Lucas has a 4.74 ERA, 1.74 WHIP and he’s walked 15 batters in just 24.2 innings (that’s a horrific 5.47 walks per nine mark). He appears to be nowhere near ready to take on major league batters.
A.J. Reed has been placed on the DL with a hamstring issue. Ugh. He’s appeared in 28 games at Triple-A swatting six homers with 21 RBI, but he also was hitting a mere .229.
Blake Snell was great his last outing, but over six outings this seasons he’s been a very moderate performer. Snell has a 3.60 ERA and 1.40 WHIP, thanks in no small part to his horrific total of 16 walks in 30 innings. The strikeouts have been there, 38 in 30 innings, but overall the results are very mixed. Doesn’t sound like he will be up soon though, a fact I wrote about earlier this week in Rays Ramblings, Tampa Rays Pitching.
For updates on Jameson Taillon and Tyler Glasnow see For the Love of Rookies.
Trea Turner is hitting .306 on the year with a .803 OPS, but he’s been struggling of late hitting a mere .237 with 12 strikeouts his last 10 games. I wrote about his contract hurdles, which could put off his call up date into July, in the April 20th Daily Trends piece.
DFS DIAMONDS
*The following list of players are guys that Ray recommends as daily plays.
CATCHER: Brian McCann has a .478 SLG versus righties this season. He’s also as consistent a power bat as we have at the catcher position. How long can Kennedy, who allowed 31 homers last season, continue along at his current pace of one homer ever two starts?
FIRST BASE: Adrian Gonzalez is batting .302 against righties this season. He’s also produced two hits in each of his last two games. He squares off with Bartolo Colon who he’s gone deep against twice with a .458 average and 1.250 OPS over 24 plate appearances.
SECOND BASE: Jonathan Schoop has a hit in 9-of-10 games. Two times he’s gone deep. He’s batting .286 with a .508 SLG this season at home. He faces Mike Pelfrey (6.23 ERA, 1.95 WHIP, .355 BAA).
THIRD BASE: Aaron Hill has three homers and nine RBI the last five games. He faces homer prone James Shields who he’s hit four homers against, with a 1.005 OPS, over 47 plate appearances.
SHORTSTOP: Righties are hitting .299 with a .351 OBP against David Price this season. Marwin Gonzalez has two homers and six RBI his last six games.
OUTFIELD: Stephen Piscotty is batting .417 with a homer, a steal, four RBI and five runs scored his last six games. Meanwhile, righties are batting .309 with a .356 OBP and .460 SLG against Jered Weaver this season.
OUTFIELD: Chris Young has hit .300 against Dallas Keuchel over 20 at-bats. Dallas has allowed righties to hit .286 this season with a .366 OBP. Young has also hit .381/.480/.667 against lefties this season.
OUTFIELD: Lefties have tore up Ubaldo Jimenez to the tune of a .355/.429/.486 line this season. Anthony Gose is no star at the dish but he’s left handed and has produced an OPS that is .185 points higher against righties than lefties.
Rick Porcello has gone 15 consecutive starts of six innings or more. Wei-Yin Chen set a career high in K’s Wednesday night. J.D. Martinez is only on pace for 25 HR’s… is it time to panic?
Ray Flowers can be heard Monday through Friday, 7 PM EDT and Friday on SiriusXM Fantasy Sports Radio (Sirius 210, XM 87). You can also hear Ray Sunday nights at 6 PM on the channel talking fantasy sports. Follow Ray’s work at Fantasy Alarm and on Twitter (@baseballguys).