NEW YORK — On June 2, 2012, the day after Johan Santana threw 134 pitches while completing the first no-hitter in New York Mets history, manager Terry Collins said he never even heard the words “pitch count” until 1982.
In his initiation to the phrase, the Los Angeles Dodgers ordered Collins, who was managing the franchise’s Class A affiliate, not to let left-hander Sid Fernandez throw more than 130 pitches because he was coming back from a sore shoulder.
On Sunday night, Collins looked like a man who wish he never heard the words “pitch count.”
Technically, it wasn’t a pitch count that did the Mets in Sunday night, when they lost to the New York Yankees 11-2 at Citi Field. It was the pitch count’s half-brother, “innings limits,” that forced Collins to pull his supposed ace, right-hander Matt Harvey, after five innings of one-hit shutout ball.
Harvey’s agent, Scott Boras, told CBSSports.com earlier this month that the Mets were putting Harvey at risk because he was on pace to throw more than 180 innings in his first season since undergoing Tommy John surgery in October 2013. Harvey is at 176 2/3 innings after Sunday.
In hopes of assuaging everyone involved, the Mets devised a plan following Harvey’s previous start Sept. 10 in which he would make three more starts this season with a predetermined innings limit each time.
It worked Sunday. And it didn’t work.
“It was extremely hard to take him out there,” Collins said as he pursed his lips and grimaced. “It was a perfect storm — the same thing we talked about the other day when we knew we were going to have to do something like this. I said he is going to pitch he is going to (allow) two hits, he’s going to have eight strikeouts.”
Pretty much. Harvey allowed only an infield single to Yankees left fielder Brett Gardner, walked one and struck out seven in an impressive 77-pitch performance.
But Collins, who is 66 years old, unsigned beyond this season (the Mets hold an option they have yet to exercise) and trying to reach the playoffs for the first time as a major league manager, knew he had no choice but to pull Harvey with a 1-0 lead, no matter how much it went against the way he was raised in baseball.
“I am at heart the old-school guy,” Collins said, “but I understand where it’s coming from and therefore you adjust to it. There are a lot of things in our game today I don’t necessarily agree with. You either adjust to it or get out. And so I’m adjusting to it.”
Then Collins flashed his familiar, self-deprecating sense of humor.
“I might get out here pretty soon,” Collins said, “but I’m gonna adjust to it right now.”
Collins certainly will pay the biggest price if Harvey’s innings limits and the accompanying drama end up contributing to a Mets collapse. General manager Sandy Alderson is signed through 2017, and Harvey is under team control through 2018, at which point Boras likely will steer him to the highest bidder.
The Mets, who lost for the fourth time in five games Sunday, lead the Washington Nationals by six games in the National League East with 13 games left. Sounds like a lot, but the lead was 9 1/2 games last Monday. Mets fans are all too familiar with what happened in 2007, when New York led the Philadelphia Phillies by seven games with 17 to play but missed the playoffs on the final day of the season.
If the Mets clinch the division, Collins said he expects Harvey won’t be limited to five innings or fewer in the playoffs. But …
“As I sit here today, the answer is I’m pretty sure it won’t happen,” Collins said. “Will it happen? I can’t answer that. That’s too far down the line right now.”
It felt further down the line after the ninth inning Sunday than it did after the fifth inning.