New York Mets pitcher, Steven Matz had his streak of seven consecutive wins broken in last night’s 6-4 loss to the Chicago White Sox. Matz took a no-decision after the bullpen was unable to hold a 4-3 lead.
Matz cruised through the first five innings of the game, not allowing a run. He set a career-high mark of 19 scoreless innings. Matz though seemed to hit a wall in the sixth as he was unable to complete the inning. Todd Frazier launched a two-run bomb off Matz that cut the lead to 4-2. Dioner Navarro later singled in Tyler Saladino who swiped two bases prior to that hit, closing the door on Matz’ day. It was noted by Matz and manager, Terry Collins that he wasn’t slowing the game down at all and was working too fast as he faced adversity.
“Just another start,” Matz said. “You take stuff out of every start. This one, maybe I’ve just got to slow myself down sometimes. That’s something that’s worked against me before, rushing out there.” (Newsday)
In 5.2 innings, Matz allowed three runs on seven hits while walking two and striking out just three. Matz, who has been so dominant since his first start of the season struggled for the first time in awhile after dominating early. Matz record still stands at 7-1 as he saw his ERA raise a bit to 2.60 after yesterday’s start.
“When I went to take him out, I asked Kevin [Plawecki] what the difference was, and he just said he thought he started rushing a little bit, and he said all the balls were in the middle of the plate,” Collins said. “We hadn’t seen those kind of swings against him probably outside of the first outing of the season, so you could tell something was wrong.”
The rookie southpaw has shown his ability to rebound well off of an off start already this year. There is no reason to believe this is nothing but a little blip on the radar for the 25 year-old Matz.
