Without “Sugar” coating it, Edwin Diaz‘s first season with the New York Mets has been a complete and utter disaster. The right-hander has accumulated a -0.2 bWAR, 5.21 ERA, 4.33 FIP, and 1.428 WHIP in 2019. He has 25 saves through 53 appearances, but that also comes with five blown saves and six losses.

The strange thing, though, is that his strikeout rate has actually been pretty consistent with his career norms as he is still averaging 14.7 K/9 as compared to 3.5 BB/9.

Diaz, 25, has largely been killed by the long ball and his inability to control his slider. He has already allowed 11 homers this season, which surpassed his career-high with a little over a month left in the season.

However, his pitching coach, Phil Regan, is not giving up on him and still believes that he can fix the issues Diaz has dealt with this season, as detailed in a fantastic article by David Lennon of Newsday.

“This guy has saved 80 games in a year and a half,” Regan said. “A lot of guys don’t save 80 games in their life. It’s there. And we’ve just got to get it out of him.”

According to Lennon, the goal they are trying to achieve with Diaz is giving him more tilt on his slider, which they are trying to do by giving him a cross-body delivery.

“I feel great,” Diaz said. “And I think my slider is getting better. If I get the slider back, everything will be fine.”

Well, on Friday night, he got to put this all to the test in front of the Mets’ faithful at Citi Field.

In the top of the 10th inning in a tie game, Diaz came in to start the inning as catcher Alex Jackson led off for the Atlanta Braves. He promptly hit Jackson, which made everyone nervous about what was to come in this outing for Diaz.

Billy Hamilton came in to pinch-run for him and Charlie Culberson went to pinch-hit for the pitcher. He promptly bunted which advanced Hamilton to second base.

Now, with the top of the order in Ronald Acuna Jr. and Ozzie Albies coming up next, the Braves were in strong position to score. It got even worse when Hamilton stole third with Acuna up.

On a 2-2 count to Acuna, though, Diaz proceeded to strike him out to suddenly limit the threat a bit and after getting to 1-2 on Albies, he struck him out too which ended the threat entirely in a 13-pitch inning.

As noted by our own Jacob Resnick, Diaz threw the hardest slider of his career (93.5 MPH) for the second strike in his battle with Albies.

Diaz and Regan both recognize the importance of that pitch for the right-hander, who has now not allowed a run in four consecutive appearances (3 1/3 innings). Although, he did let two inherited runners score against the Kansas City Royals on August 15 as he entered with the bases loaded.

With the team currently 2.0 games back of the second NL Wild Card spot, they could certainly use a boost to push them into the playoffs. A return to 2018 where Diaz had 57 saves and a 1.96 ERA would go a long way in helping the Mets secure a playoff spot.