Thor, Mets Throw Caution to Wind, Suffer Immediate Consequences

When Noah Syndergaard showed up to spring training having indulged in “Bowls of Doom” to gain 17 pounds with a view towards throwing even harder — this, after a season in which his fastball averaged 98 mph — alarm bells began clanging around the country. Among those waving red flags was the present author.

Here’s what I wrote on Feb. 13, 2017:

As exciting as all this [added strength] sounds, perhaps someone should pump the breaks. For a pitcher who threw harder than any other starter, who threw a variant of a fastball on 60% of his offerings, more velocity might not be such a great development. While we don’t have a full understanding of why so many pitchers are breaking down, perhaps the body is being pushed beyond its physical limits with the strength and velocity increases in the game. No one, among starter pitchers, is pushing limits like Syndergaard.

After pushing the limits in 2016, Syndergaard was attempting to push even harder against them this year. Perhaps he pushed too hard, flew too close to the sun, etc. Pitchers’ ligaments and soft tissue aren’t unlike wax wings; velocity, not unlike the sun. Record pitch speeds have wrought a record numbers of injuries. That Syndergaard is on the DL is, sadly, one of the least surprising developments early this season.

Sports-injury expert Will Carroll told FanGraphs on Monday that Syndergaard’s offseason work was likely unhelpful.

“It’s very likely a kinetic-chain issue. It reminds me of Stephen Strasburg a couple seasons ago where it worked its way down — shoulder, trap, lat, lower back,” Carroll said. “The question for Syndergaard is whether he exacerbated these mechanical issues with the addition of more force from his legs and back. If he didn’t increase his efficiency, it [his offseason work] was counterproductive.”

The Mets are going to be without their ace for some time, and they really can’t afford to be without him long after a 10-14 April that dropped their FanGraphs’ playoff odds to 31.4%. Carroll put a six- to eight-week timetable on Syndergaard’s return to the mound.

Maybe Syndergaard was due to land on the DL no matter what in 2017. The list of young high-velocity throwers to have suffered injury is, of course, a long one in recent years. The best young talents in the game — such as Strasburg and, of course, the late Jose Fernandez — were unable to avoid surgery, likely in part due to the stresses their stuff placed on their elbows. Strasburg has reached 200 innings once in a season, even as the Nationals have been accused of exercising too much caution with him. While Gerrit Cole hasn’t endured surgery, he has landed on the DL five times in the last three seasons (and once due to a lat).

The Mets and Syndergaard will unlikely be charged with using too much caution. And that’s what makes this injury unfortunate: there was seemingly little care taken with arguably the game’s top young arm.

Syndergaard himself refused to be thrust into an MRI machine following a start that caused him to experience biceps discomfort. While Syndergaard perhaps chose poorly, it was his right not to go into an MRI machine.

“I can’t tie him down and throw him in the tube, either,” said Mets GM Sandy Alderson to NJ.com.

But the Mets’ decision-makers — older, wiser adults — should be familiar with the sense of invulnerability young people can feel. The Mets didn’t have to put him back on the mound Sunday if they had any concerns. And they had concerns. Syndergaard returned to the mound Sunday and left with a partially torn right lat, a significant muscle in the kinetic chain in the act of pitching.

While the lat isn’t the tender biceps about which Syndergaard previously complained, a weakness in one area of the body can lead to injury in another if stress is redistributed. And it’s not just that the Mets put Syndergaard back on the mound Sunday, it’s that they left him on the mound to struggle through a high-stress 31-pitch first inning — and inning during which he allowed five runs — and to return for seven pitches in the second before he was removed.

Why is one of the game’s most talented arms, about whom the team is already concerned, allowed to toss a high-stress, 31-pitch inning? It’s not clear.

For Syndergaard, the silver lining is this: perhaps this can be an important lesson.

As John Smoltz noted in a recent piece by Ken Rosenthal for FOX Sports, too many young pitchers are trying to max out, trying throw with 100% effort all of the time. Pitchers, of course, like Syndergaard.

“(In the past), each pitcher was given the opportunity to learn what kind of pitcher they were going to be,” Smoltz said, “Now they’re all robots.”

“I call it the red-line factor. When you keep running your engine above the red line, you’re going to blow it out. If you race your car hard for too long a period, it’s going to overheat. We’re getting dangerously close to every pitcher red-lining when he doesn’t really have to. They’re not preparing to learn how to pitch like it’s a six-gear car. They’re always in sixth gear. Never in fourth or fifth.”

This is not a new idea, that pitchers should learn to pitch at different gears. It’s at least 105 years old. Carroll noted that, in Christy Mathewson’s book Pitching in a Pinch — published in 1912 — Mathewson writes that pitchers must learn to navigate stretches of the lineup at less than 100%, to conserve energy and reduce stress.

Instead, the showcase era of baseball has produced pitchers too concerned with radar readings, and we’re guilty of often being fascinated with average fastball readings at FanGraphs. If a pitcher’s fastball velocity is down, we will red-flag the pitcher.

Syndergaard, like so many young arms, has never learned how to pitch at different gears. It’s perhaps why he’s on the DL today and the Mets are in a pinch. It’s said that wisdom can only be gained through experience — or, in this case, through a 105-year-old book. The good news is Thor has not been lost for the season and he doesn’t require surgery. And perhaps this short-term loss can result in a long-term gain: a pitcher who returns wiser and better positioned for long-term success.

The real mistake, the real folly, will be if Syndergaard (and the Mets) learn nothing from this experience.