After a good night’s sleep followed by pancakes and bacon for breakfast with real maple syrup, not that Aunt Jemima crap, I’m ready to move on and put Saturday’s Game 4 shit-show behind me.
The mission is simple. We need to win three games in a row, and as impossible as that may seem, the Mets have put together 11 and 8 game winning streaks already this season, so hey, you never know.
With the odds clearly stacked against us, the three biggest reasons for maintaining hope are Matt Harvey, Jacob deGrom and Noah Syndergaard.
“If you get those three guys, the way they’re capable of throwing the ball, although we are down and we are in a hole you’ve got to feel good with those three guys on the hill,” David Wright told reporters last night.
But let’s not get too far ahead of ourselves, the only game that matters is Game 5 tonight. Our entire season – and it’s been a great one – is now riding on the Dark Knight of Gotham. Win and we move on to Game 6, lose and it’s all over.
Harvey has already seen what the Royals can do when he pitched against them in Game 1, and while he wasn’t terrible that night, it wasn’t the dominant Matt Harvey many of us expected.
Harvey relied too much on the scouting reports and sparingly threw his fastball against the hard-hitting Royals, relying mostly on his secondary pitches. He was also pitching after a long layoff.
“I don’t know if that was the 10 days off or just a matter of feel,” Harvey said. “I felt like I really didn’t have the greatest control with my fastball and the greatest life.”
Harvey says he’s up for tonight’s challenge and that he’s always embraced pitching in a big spot. Tonight’s game will be the biggest spot of his life.
“Matt has to give us one of those great outings he’s capable of giving us,” Mets manager Terry Collins said. “We’re in a tough situation, but we’re not dead yet.”
Harvey, 24, will not be holding back tonight and much like Noah Syndergaard in Game 3, he plans to be aggressive and in attack mode.
“They’re doing a great job of adjusting to us, and how we pitch,” Harvey said. “We have to do a better job of doing that to them.”
“Obviously Noah showed that they are a team that can swing and miss. He found his own way of making them a little uncomfortable, and we have to all do a better job of that, and I think our second crack at it, we have a lot more confidence.”
This is it Matt… This is the moment you’ve been waiting for. Your chance to become a legend. A winning performance tonight and any tarnish your super hero image may have taken will be wiped clean. It will be a rebirth in a sense.
But more importantly, a dominating effort tonight will entrench your status as a warrior and a big-game pitcher. Go out there and pitch the game of your life. A hopeful fan base and all of your teammates are looking to you to keep the Mets alive and in this World Series fight. Tonight’s the Knight… Let’s Go Mets.
