Just Mets

The Mets will revert back to a standard rotation over the next week, and could consider skipping a starter with two off-days next week.

But later in May, the Mets will play 20 consecutive games between May 8 and May 27, and that means the Mets are likely to use a sixth starter in a spot start during that stretch of games.

As such, Sandy Alderson told reporters on Thursday they could consider using Steven Matz or Noah Syndergaard as that sixth starter.

“If it were possible we’d love to get them a little major league experience this year but you never know,” Alderson said, according to Mike Vorkunov of the Star Ledger.

Matz is off to a good start with Triple-A Las Vegas – he is 3-1 with a 1.84 ERA in five appearances and four starts. He was fantastic in his start against Reno last night, allowing just a run on five hits with two walks and 12 strikeouts in seven innings, throwing 70 of his 101 pitches for strikes.

As for Syndergaard, his season has been up and down thanks to illness and inconsistency. But he was dominant in his most recent start, allowing only two hits with nine strikeouts in seven innings.

It seems logical to expect Syndergaard would get the nod over Matz first if they choose to pass over Rafael Montero for the opportunity. Matz is still about 50 innings short of what the club prefers their pitchers to have thrown above Double-A, whereas Syndergaard is well above that threshold already.

It certainly can be argued Matz has moved ahead of Syndergaard development wise, but the Mets have remained very consistent with how they’ve handled the innings build up and counts, so there’s no reason to expect they’ll deviate in this case.