When Johan Santana had shoulder surgery last September, the Mets knew he would be unavailable to them until the middle of the 2011 season, at best. So for the first three months of the season, the Mets would need an interim ace.
Finding that pitcher would be a challenge, if only because replacing someone of Santana’s stature is no simple task. Santana is one of a handful of elite pitchers of his generation, and although Cliff Lee was available through free agency, the Mets were not going to spend the necessary money to sign him. The replacement, therefore, would have to come from within.
So on Jan. 19, the new manager Terry Collins named Mike Pelfrey to fill the titular role of ace, based on his success in 2010, when he went 15-9 with a 3.66 earned run average and barely missed making the National League All-Star team.
But so far this season, Pelfrey has not lived up to the billing. The Mets have played five games, and Pelfrey has started their only two losses. He was beaten by the Marlins on opening day when he allowed a grand slam to John Buck, and on Wednesday night he was pounded mercilessly.
The Phillies built a big early lead, then rallied again for a 10-7 victory over the Mets, who now face Roy Halladay in Thursday’s series finale.
“I was awful,” Pelfrey said. “Anytime the team scores seven runs, I’ve got to win. This is the second time. I was bad last week, and I was even worse tonight. I let them down again.”
In two starts, Pelfrey is 0-1 with a 15.63 earned run average. Although he pitched through pain in his shoulder last season, he said he was fine now, and he blamed his pitch selection for Wednesday’s debacle.
He faced 16 batters in two-plus innings and retired only six. He gave up seven runs and eight hits, including a home run to Ryan Howard, who tied a career high with four hits and went 4 for 4 with the homer and two doubles, and also walked. Phillies center fielder Shane Victorino had a triple and a double, and Placido Polanco had three hits and three runs batted in.
Phillies reliever Jose Contreras pitched the ninth for his first save in place of the injured Brad Lidge.
Philadelphia scored in each of the first three innings and led, 7-0, but what started as a rout turned into something much more interesting. The Mets tied the score, 7-7, after Pelfrey left, getting two runs in the fourth and five in the fifth, but the Phillies then battered reliever Blaine Boyer the way they hammered Pelfrey.
Boyer, a right-hander with a distinctive red beard, gave up two runs in the fifth and another in the sixth on a Ben Francisco home run that landed 10 rows into the left-field bleachers.
After he was done pitching, Boyer went into the clubhouse and, in an act born more of pragmatism than anger, shaved off his beard, leaving just a small goatee. Although not normally superstitious, Boyer had allowed the beard to fill out and lengthen as he continued to pitch well in spring training and earned a spot in the bullpen, and his wife convinced him to keep it.
But after Wednesday’s performance?
“I finally had a reason to get rid of it,” he said. “I hated it.”
Pelfrey’s issues may not be as easy to solve. He was not awful in the first game, but he appeared completely ill at ease Wednesday. He said he relied too much on his second-best pitches, the slider and curveball, instead of going with his strengths, his two-seam fastball and split-finger fastball, all of which are called for by catcher Josh Thole.
“It’s on me,” Pelfrey said. “I went along with everything. I didn’t shake, and that’s totally on me for going along.”
When Collins came out to remove Pelfrey with the bases loaded and no outs in the third inning, he stood on the mound and said that if the Mets got out of that situation, they would come back in the game.
Collins was half right. The Mets did not get out of the situation; Taylor Buchholz gave up two hits that scored the three runners Pelfrey left on base.
But the Mets did come back. They scored twice in the fourth inning on Angel Pagan’s two-run homer, then got five in the fifth.
But Boyer faltered in the bottom of the fifth, and instead of the theme of the game being about how the scrappy Mets had refused to quit and overcame a daunting deficit, it was about how their nominal ace had once again performed poorly.
“It’s only two starts,” Collins said. “You can’t overreact right now. I know he’ll do better.” (NY Times)
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