Every great baseball season is sprinkled with so many profound and uplifting stories, some that even transcend the game itself. Stories within a story that sometimes gets lost amidst all the balls and strikes, safe and out calls, wins and losses.
I love the stories of the late bloomers who come out of nowhere to inspire and lead their teams, or those unheralded youngsters who show up to the big leagues and perform way beyond anyone’s expectations. The Mets have certainly had their share of those this season, haven’t they.
Then there’s Bartolo Colon, a larger than life baseball treasure, who doesn’t really fit so neatly into those aforementioned categories. Bartolo deserves a category unto himself.
Watching Bartolo Colon pitch is one of the great joys of baseball. The way he performs his craft so effortlessly at the ripe old age of 43 is not only astounding and uncanny, it really is a thing of beauty.
As Mets fans, we are so fortunate to have this titan of the mound leading our rotation and providing the consistent performance that has kept this team afloat in a season that has been beset with far too many injuries to our young and promising players.
And it’s not just his prowess on the mound that separates Colon from most other pitchers, it’s all the other thing he brings to the table, in particular his valuable veteran leadership and the special bond he’s developed with all his teammates. It wouldn’t surprise me one bit if Bartolo was the most respected player in the Mets clubhouse.
It amazes me that at a time when the Mets are getting socked with a slew of devastating injury news on several of their key players, that it was Bartolo Colon above all others who came forward and stepped up his game, providing the leadership and a steady hand that the team needed to navigate through the last two weeks.
After another spectacular performance on Monday against the Cincinnati Reds, Colon is 3-0 with a 2.39 ERA in his last four starts.
In his latest act, it was mesmerizing to see him escape a pair of jams with a runner on third and no outs. It was like watching a neurosurgeon perform the most delicate and dangerous of procedures with such remarkable ease. Not only did Colon walk away with a scoreless six inning performance that lowered his season’s ERA to 3.22, but he didn’t even break a sweat doing it.
There were a pair of special moments in his outing that really stood out for me. The first was after Colon navigated through that two on, nobody out jam. After he got the third out, the camera followed him to the dugout before cutting to a commercial. There was Colon standing amongst his peers a little winded, when I saw Travis d’Arnaud walk up and hug him as Bartolo smiled and hugged him back. I don’t really know what precipitated that, but it was a poignant moment you rarely get to see.
The true highlight of the game for me didn’t even go in the Mets’ favor. It was an epic at-bat in that same sixth inning that pitted Reds slugger Joey Votto against Bartolo Colon in a tense showdown when the game was still on the line.
After putting Votto in an 0-2 hole, the All Star first baseman worked the count to 3-2 and then kept fouling one pitch after another off with neither player willing to give up an inch. Eventually Votto worked out a walk as Colon was unwilling to give him that pitch over the plate he desperately wanted.
As he jogged to first base, Votto glanced over at Colon who nodded his head and Votto did the same. Two baseball giants paying each other some respect. It was a cool ending to a key moment in the game.
You cannot measure what Bartolo Colon has meant to the young arms who look up to him and try to emulate his straight forward approach to throwing strikes and trusting your stuff. Clearly, his value to the team this season cannot be overstated.
The Mets are 12-4 in their last 16 games and 25 percent of those wins are on account of Bartolo. This latest win, the 231st of his career, makes Colon the active MLB leader in wins and he ties Luis Tiant for the second most wins All Time by a Latin American-born pitcher.
I don’t know about you, but I’m so glad that I’ve had the opportunity to see this class act pitch for my beloved Mets. And I truly hope we are not seeing the last of him and that he will return to pitch for the orange and blue next year which he says will be his final season.
Watching Bartolo close out his career in Flushing would be a fitting end to a remarkable career and one of the best storylines of the 2017 season for the New York Mets.
