Joel Sherman of the NY Post argues that it’s a mistake for the Mets to use a 6 man rotation.
The Mets’ plan is to limit the amount of innings for their starters, especially Matt Harvey‘s since it’s his first year back from Tommy John surgery.
While Sherman understands that the Mets want to be cautious with Harvey, he believes they need to be maximizing their ace now before he reaches free agency.
“Harvey is due to be a free agent after the 2018 season.The Mets have a financially conservative general manager and ownership. The chances Harvey is pitching for the Mets in 2019 is what? Five percent?”
“Notice “maximizing,” not “abusing.” No one is suggesting Harvey throw 125 pitches regularly or be pushed extra innings within games. But I would want more starts, not fewer from Harvey for the next 3 ¹/₂ years. I would want to get my money’s worth before I couldn’t afford him.”
Sherman also points out that Harvey is a Scott Boars client, who will want top dollar.
“Harvey is a client of Scott Boras, who is renowned for taking his best clients to free agency to seek peak market value. Remember, the Tigers offered Max Scherzer $144 million before last season, the Boras client rejected it and got $210 million from the Nationals.”
“And I respect their forward thinking in trying the six-man rotation. But at full health, Gee should be used as a safety net, not an equal to the Mets’ best starters.”
Meanwhile, Harvey’s agent Scott Boras told Mike Vorkunov of NJ.com that he is very pleased with how the Mets are handling his client.
“You cannot expect – and certainly Matt expects it – but doctors will tell you that you have to titrate this process. You cannot come back and treat a season after Tommy John as if it is a normal season. It has to be treated with caution.”
“On a scenario where we’re working on a long-term view of both Matt’s interest and the Mets’ interests, I’m glad the Mets are thinking of ways to surround Matt with a program when they can keep his innings in a very, very manageable way,” Boras said.
“We know that pitchers after Tommy John, when they’ve had 160, 170 innings we know they’ve come back very effectively. Certainly with (Stephen) Strasburg, Jordan Zimmermann, we’ve seen that program work effectively for those pitchers. I think that would be certainly a very prudent plan to look at for Matt Harvey as well.”
Thoughts:
The worst thing that can happen is that the Mets push Harvey too hard and he suffers a setback.
Not only will losing Harvey be devastating for team’s playoff aspirations, but the front office would face severe backlash for mishandling their star pitcher.
I also think Sherman is overly cynical about Harvey’s future with the organization. Even though the Mets have not spent a lot in recent years, I feel like Harvey is the exception to the rule much like David Wright was a few seasons ago.
The “Dark Knight” is arguably the face of the franchise now with Wright’s future in jeopardy. I think the Mets will do everything possible to try to keep him in Queens.
