Just Mets

It seems like Noah Syndergaard is having his best start of the year with regularity these days.

He has a 1.28 ERA over his last six starts, allowing a total of six earned runs on only 24 hits with 43 strikeouts in 42 innings over that span.

But on Tuesday, Syndergaard did indeed have his best start of his young big league career, tossing eight shutout innings while allowing only three baserunners with nine strikeouts.

“I feel like from the moment I made my debut in Chicago and where I’m at right now, it’s just been a huge transition,” Syndergaard explained of his instant success. “I’ve learned so much from [Dan Warthen] and [Matt Harvey] and [Jacob deGrom] and [Bartolo Colon], even with the language barrier there.”

Mets manager Terry Collins agreed, and has taken notice of Syndergaard’s proactive education.

“He is an absolute sponge when it comes to learning what he’s gotta do to be successful,” Collins explained. “His first two weeks here, every night he paid attention, every night he’s asking questions, every night he’s talking to guys on the bench about stuff. And, he’s just absorbed it. And now he’s taking it to the mound.”

He improved to 5-5 with a 2.70 ERA in 2015 with his brilliant performance on Tuesday.

Collins likened Syndergaard’s quick success in the big leagues to Harvey’s in 2012 and 2013, although he said he didn’t expect this from his new right-hander.

“I don’t think any of us could have predicted the rise to where he’s at this fast,” Mets manager Terry Collins said. “All the reports we got on him were: good arm, command needs to be helped, secondary pitches sometimes are ineffective. I gotta tell you something, this guy has not shown any of that here.”

There have been growing pains at times with Syndergaard, but hardly noticeable in the three months he’s been here. In fact, he’s shown tremendous poise and maturity on the days he doesn’t have his best command, such as his previous outing against Washington when he was erratic, but still managed to keep the Nationals at bay for five innings and keep the team in the game.

But Syndergaard was anything except erratic on Tuesday. He retired the first 18 batters he faced until Will Venable led off the seventh inning with a single. He was in complete command of his fastball and had the ability to place it anywhere he wanted to. He kept it down and on the corners, and had the Padres completely fooled with his baffling curveball.

In fact, the Padres swung and missed at five of the 11 curveballs Syndergaard threw for strikes, and they did not reach base on that pitch the entire night.

It’s starts like this which explain precisely why the Mets don’t want to trade from their crop of top-tiered pitching. They have a shutdown formula with this rotation even with an innings limit, as they can bridge that gap to what’s still a lockdown bullpen even without Jenrry Mejia in the fold. It’s a matter of getting the kind of bat that can help them score, “just enough” runs to win on a regular basis.

What does that mean? Finding guys who can move runners up a base, get bunts down, have the speed to go first-to-third on a single, and a guy who has the ability to drive in two with runners in scoring position with the team down a run. Yes, a guy like Troy Tulowitzki gets that done, but maybe at the cost of a Syndergaard and more, which waters down the goal they’d be attempting to accomplish while potentially undermining the blueprint which is clearly working.

Collins realizes the assets he has, and knows it can be a formidable enemy in a short series.

“If we keep going and we can really, really play well the next couple of months, I don’t know of too many teams that want to face this staff in a playoff situation,” the manager said with a grin.