The first two games of the World Series have not been particularly kind to Mets starting pitching. Both Matt Harvey and Jacob deGrom, while not terrible by any means, were certainly off their games. This begs the question: has the fatigue of the long season become too much?
In Game 1, Harvey went six innings, allowing three runs on five hits while walking two and striking out two. He ended up getting pulled after just 80 pitches, 53 of which were strikes.
Last night, deGrom, who has had to battle without his best stuff at times recently, struggled even more. He lasted just five frames, giving up four runs on six hits and three walks. He too struck out just a pair of Royals hitters and needed 94 pitches to get through five.
With Harvey especially, perhaps the workload of this season has finally gotten to him.
“I didn’t feel all that great, so I had to mix things up,” Harvey said after Tuesday’s game. “Obviously from the first pitch on, I knew I had to mix things in and try to keep them off balance. Unfortunately I wasn’t able to do that in the sixth inning. For a good stretch there, I was getting some quick outs but unfortunately I wasn’t able to hold the lead.”
Harvey is now up to 208 innings on the year, not including the 22.2 he tossed in spring training, after not pitching in any live games last year. Scott Boras did have a point — this is pretty unprecedented for a Tommy John Surgery patient.
deGrom was worked even harder this year, throwing 216 innings between the regular season and playoffs, not including one in the All-Star Game and 26 in spring training. Between the minor leagues and Triple-A, deGrom threw 178.2 last year.
This is not to say the Mets should have altered how they used their starters late in the season and early in the playoffs. After all, the NL East race was tight well into September. However, deGrom and Harvey have been inconsistent lately, mostly due to a lack of command. deGrom has walked three twice this postseason. He only did that four times over the course of the entire season.
Maybe they’ve just happened to have a few off days (which pitchers have all the time) and this is just being fueled by the Mets’ inability to score runs or play defense. Either way, it’s a legitimate question to bring up.
To come back and win this series, deGrom and Harvey will both have to leave it all out on the field for one more start. Let’s hope they have something left in them.
