Between his 7.2 very solid innings, six strikeouts, three hits and four RBIs, Steven Matz‘s debut proved to be worth the wait.
Drafted in the 2nd round of the 2009 MLB Draft, Matz did not make it to a professional mound until 2012 due to complications following Tommy John surgery. Eventually battling back to debut with the Kingsport Mets, the Stony Brook native shot quickly up the Mets ranks to achieve the esteem of a top prospect, and now a major league starter.
“It’s unbelievable, it’s like a dream,” said Vito Cervone, a former catcher of Matz at Ward Melville, seated in section 113 Sunday to see his former battery mate’s debut. “I’m living vicariously through him.”
With more than two years of rehabbing following surgery in 2009, and the prospect of having to potentially undergo a second Tommy John operation, it at one point became a real question whether a day like Sunday would ever be possible. Mets catcher Kevin Plawecki said Matz persevering to make it to this point is just a testament to how hard pitchers who’ve had Tommy John have to work.
“Anyone who goes through a surgery like that, you Harvey, Wheeler too, it’s a tough surgery, but it just shows the work ethic that all these guys have,” he said. “Unfortunately it’s part of the game nowadays. Thank goodness there’s doctors and rehab programs good enough to get these guys back healthy and where they were beforehand.”
His MLB debut would be further delayed by an addition three hours and 26 minutes as Saturday’s suspended game concluded, during which time Matz told 1988 AL Cy Young Award winner and current Las Vegas 51s pitching coach Frank Viola that he “must have walked three miles” waiting for the first game to end. Viola told WSOU, Seton Hall’s student radio station, how proud he was of Matz.
“It’s like watching a child of yours get the chance to do something that a lot of people have always wanted to do,” he said.
Viola said above all, Matz is genuinely a good person.
“He’s more than just a baseball player, that’s secondary, he’s just a wonderful person, terrific kid, you root for people like that,” Viola said. “The world need more people like Steven Matz.”
Matz’s debut marks the last of a tidal wave of young arms coming through the Mets system in recent years. Now that these long-awaited prospects are here, as Terry Collins said, the future, now shifts to the present.
“It sends a message to our fan base that the future is now,” he said. “We’ve been talking about down the road, next year, next year; the future is now.
(Photos By: Clayton Collier, MMO)
