These things I do not understand:
If the New York Mets wanted to conserve Matt Harvey’s innings, why did they wait until now to do it and jeopardize Harvey’s availability for the post-season?
Why didn’t they learn anything from the Washington Nationals’ similar experience with Stephen Strasburg in 2012?
If players are bigger and stronger than their baseball ancestors, why do pitchers seemingly incur more injuries than pitchers of previous eras?
If teams pamper young pitchers to protect and preserve their arms, why is there an epidemic of elbow injuries that leave the 60 ½ feet between the mound and home plate littered with so many of those young pitchers?
Why could pitchers like Warren Spahn, Robin Roberts, Steve Carlton, Tom Seaver and Ferguson Jenkins pitch without limits on the number of innings or pitches in a game and not develop sore arms?
In the last week Mets fans and baseball writers have been consumed with the case of Harvey, the talented young pitcher back this season from elbow surgery in which he had a ligament transplant, popularly known as Tommy John surgery.
The focal point of the firestorm of controversy that erupted was the number of innings Harvey would pitch this year. It was reminiscent of the controversy that flared in Washington three years ago.
In that instance in 2012, the Nationals put a limit of 160 innings on their young star, Strasburg, who had elbow surgery in September 2010.
They shut him down with 159 1/3 innings after his Sept. 7 start, and he missed the division playoff series, which the Nationals lost to St. Louis, three games to two.
The Harvey controversy flared last week when Scott Boras, the pitcher’s agent, and Sandy Alderson, the Mets’ general manager, disagreed about an innings limit for the right-hander. Boras said he had spoken with Dr. James Andrews, who did Harvey’s transplant and recommended a 180-innings limit. Alderson had a different interpretation.
Alderson later suggested a compromise, but it would require Harvey to miss starts in the final weeks of the regular season and most likely in the post-season. How sharp or effective might he be after missing large chunks of time?
The Mets, of course, could avoid the missed starts by not making the playoffs. Their fans wouldn’t go for that solution.
The question I have is why did the Mets wait until now to deal with the problem. Why didn’t the Mets foresee the potential problem at the start of the season and work out a sensible solution then? Alderson did not return a telephone call to answer that question or discuss the issue.
A friend of mine who is a former baseball executive offered this suggestion as an answer to my question:
“Nobody expected the Mets to get into the playoffs so why would you limit his innings for the post-season. In addition the fans wanted to see him.”
After his last start, on Tuesday, Harvey had pitched 171 2/3 innings this season, leaving room for one more good start or two bad ones. Harvey has started 26 games this season, averaging 6 2/3 innings per start. Had the Mets skipped one Harvey start a month for the first five months, they would have 33 1/3 innings to play with in September and October.
On second thought, maybe the Mets are being unnecessarily overcautious. Because of the injury epidemic, all teams have become overcautious with pitchers, and some people, this person among them, believe it is unnecessary.
It is a trend that is approaching 50 years.
The first sign was the scuttling of four-man pitching rotations in the late ‘60s and early ‘70s in favor of five starters. The Baltimore Orioles’ feat of having four 20-game winners in their 1971 rotation would not be matched because five-man rotations don’t provide pitchers with enough starts to realistically win 20 games.
In the next 15 years or so pitch counts and innings limits followed, and the pampering of pitchers was complete.
The puzzling aspect of these developments is pitchers continue to suffer sore arm in spite of these efforts that are supposed to protect them.
Looking back in history, we can find many examples of pre-pampering pitching. Here are several:
Robin Roberts pitched more than 300 innings for six straight seasons, completing 161 games in that span. He once told me the only time he had a sore arm was when he mixed in some relief appearances among his many starts.
Steve Carlton pitched more than 250 innings in 15 years of a 16-season span.
Tom Seaver pitched more than 250 innings in 12 years of a 14-year span.
Ferguson Jenkins pitched more than 270 innings in nine years of a 10-year stretch.
Warren Spahn, in the segment of his career when he pitched from age 26 through 42, threw between 245 amd 310 innings each season, completing 361 of 592 starts. Last season major league pitchers completed 118 of 2,430 games.
In the 2006 oral history “The Only Game in Town” by Fay Vincent, the former commissioner, Spahn says one of the things he doesn’t understand about today’s baseball “is that guys pitch once a week, they pitch five innings. They don’t pitch in relief, they don’t pitch batting practice.
“You know, to me your arm is like your legs; you’ve got to use them to keep them in shape. And how in the heck can these guys today stay off the disabled list with what little throwing they do? I threw more than anybody ever – I did all the things you shouldn’t do as a pitcher. I threw in the outfield and whatever, but I did it for rhythm. I did it to feel making the ball stay on the same plane and backspin and whatever, so it helped me in my pitching.
“You know, everything today is predicated on preventing a sore arm and the five-man rotation and counting the pitches. Well, we get more sore arms now than we ever had in history. And it’s because pitchers never get their arms in shape.”
Infielders, Spahn adds, throw every day. “Why doesn’t a pitcher? And I think baseball has made cripples out of pitchers, or freaks, and I don’t think it’s right.”
Spahn, who won more games (363) than any other left-hander, said he never had a sore arm. Bob Feller, in the same book, said he never had a sore arm. Harvey and Strasburg cannot make the same claim.