Often times for young starting pitchers, there’s a fine line between their ability to pitch effectively and get knocked out quickly when they are not effective.
But then there are pitchers like Noah Syndergaard, who on Wednesday showed exactly how far he had come from the pitcher who struggled at Triple-A for most of the 2014 season and was personally disappointed he did not earn a September call-up in the eyes of Sandy Alderson and team brass last summer.
Now, by no means was Syndergaard’s start against the Nationals on Wednesday easy. The 1-2-3 first inning would be his last, as he allowed ten Nationals to reach base over the next four innings thanks to five singles and five walks.
“I couldn’t really get comfortable,” Syndergaard said after the game. “I just had to really battle out there.”
And battle he did, showing the guile and pitching maturity the club was waiting for from him in 2014 but never came to stave off what seemed like certain damage against him routinely for five innings on Wednesday, allowing just a single run with four seemingly very large strikeouts to his ledger.
The difference between the Syndergaard of today and the Syndergaard of a year ago was, in the face of certain danger on Wednesday, he maintained faith in his curveball and change-up, keeping them down in the zone to induce some key groundouts in the second and third innings in particular to stand a total of five Nationals on-base.
But despite the successful navigation of those rocky waters, Syndergaard expressed disappointment in the way he threw.
“I knew this was a huge game and a big series,” Syndergaard explained. “I’m pretty disappointed in the way I threw. Five walks, that can’t really happen in the big leagues.”
Even so, his gutsy effort was still more than good enough to earn a victory.
He seemed to struggle with his mechanics at times during this outing. He was clearly flying open with his hips, evident by his pitches routinely being out of the strike zone and away from the left-handed hitters when he was clearly trying to come inside. He was also falling off to the first base side, particularly from the stretch, further suggesting he was flying open.
It was clear he knew it too, and he was making a conscious effort to stay closed when it would happen.
Nevertheless, he used his head and stayed mentally strong to give his manager five very valuable innings on Wednesday in which he threw 53 of his 98 pitches for strikes.
“Noah wasn’t real sharp today, but he worked hard,” Terry Collins said after the game. “When you’ve got 10 runners in five innings, you’ve had to work really hard to get out of it. We’re trying to do the best we can to make sure these kids stay healthy, our young pitching, so I thought that was enough.”
Unfortunately for Syndergaard and the Mets, the gutsy effort went for naught. But it’s efforts like this in which onlookers can take note.
The Mets young rotation is truly special, and in many ways exceeding the already high expectations that are on them so early in their careers. But, they’re not going to have it everyday, much to the chagrin of the audience. But when that happens, they need these guys to will their way through these struggles, not let innings get out of hand, and find ways to keep the team in the ballgame.
Syndergaard did that on Wednesday, and more.
Just Mets 