By David Gibb
If you didn’t see this coming, please go get your eyes checked. In fact, you may not want to drive for a few days, as you are clearly impaired. If you didn’t absolutely know that Pedro Martinez was going to get hurt within the first month of the season, you have been struck blind by viral fanboyism.
If you missed it, here’s what happened. Martinez was on the hill in the top of the fourth inning, pitching to Marlins’ catcher Matt Treanor. It had already been a tough night for Pedro, who through three innings of work had surrendered four runs, including a gopher ball to veteran outfielder Luis Gonzalez and a two-run blast to second baseman Dan Uggla. Martinez was struggling mightily to miss bats, having struck out only one. He had thrown 57 pitches to get nine outs. Regardless of what happened with Treanor, it was already a rough night.
Then, Pedro followed through on his 0-2 pitch to Treanor, and immediately signaled that his hamstring was bothering him. Well, either that, or his knickers were in a twist. About thirty seconds later, Pedro was off the field and in the clubhouse. Martinez and the Mets parted ways Wednesday morning, as he was sent back to New York for an MRI which confirmed a “mild strain” of his left hamstring. The team believes he will miss four to six weeks.
(If you’re keeping score at home, Treanor grounded out to third baseman David Wright, who made a wild throw across the diamond, forcing Carlos Delgado to swipe tag Treanor, hitting him in the helmet and knocking him to the ground. But I digress.)
Pedro’s early DL trip presents a major problem, as injuries are already beginning to thin out a Mets rotation that was supposed to be one of the deepest in baseball. Orlando “El Duque” Hernandez is already on this disabled list, recovering from a surgery that removed a grotesquely large bunion from his right foot (if you believe he’ll be back any time soon, I have some miracle snake oil to sell you), and Pedro joining him on the DL gives the Mets a five-man rotation of Santana, Maine, Perez, Pelfrey, and a starter to be named later.
That fifth starter will most likely be Jorge Sosa, who started 14 games for the Metropolitans last year, pitching adequately. Beyond Sosa, however, the Mets 40-man roster contains almost no pitchers with appreciable Major League experience, especially starting.
Sosa’s insertion into the rotation would not do any favors to Mike Pelfrey and Oliver Perez. While Mets fans are high on Pelfrey, he has a career ERA of over five and a half at the big league level, and realistically projects not as an ace, as many fans litke to think, but as a career fifth starter. Perez, who had a very solid 2007 with a 3.56 ERA and 174 strikeouts in 177 innings will feel increased pressure with Martinez out of the rotation, and may revert to the erratic mechanics and fragile confidence with caused him to tally three seasons with ERAs above 5.00 in his first six Major League seasons.
Allowing optimism for a moment, let us suppose Pedro recovers in four weeks and returns to the rotation. Well, I hate to be Debbie Downer, but that is just as troubling for the Mets. Every day Pedro pitches, it is largely accepted by fans, players, Willie Randolph, and even Pedro himself that the bullpen will most likely need to pitch at least three innings. On Tuesday night, Pedro demonstrated that throwing even 57 pitches (which is about five innings worth of work on a very efficient night) has become a problem for the former ace. Pedro’s presence in the rotation across an entire season could put the kind of strain on a bullpen that leads to massive late-season collapses.
I wonder if the Mets can imagine what that’s like.