The last time Mets ace Max Scherzer toed the slab at Citi Field, the San Diego Padres took his lunch money, gave him a swirlie and sent him home with an atomic wedgie the size of Long Island.
For Scherzer, Game 1 of last year’s Wild Card Series against the Padres was a night to forever delete from the memory bank: four brown-and-yellow big flies, seven runs allowed across just 4 2/3 innings. In the postgame press conference that night, the heterochromatic future Hall of Famer looked despondent, dejected and, most concerningly, utterly confused.
But on Monday night in Queens, admittedly on a much, much smaller stage, Scherzer got a morsel of revenge, silencing San Diego’s lineup across five scoreless frames in his first home start of the season. His only blemishes on the evening were a trio of early walks and a fifth inning, no-hitter-ending single courtesy of Ha-Seong Kim. Scherzer did not return for the sixth, but the bullpen held firm and the Mets won 5-0.
For the Mets and their fans, Scherzer’s first win of the year was a sigh of relief. The 38-year-old righty had struggled in his previous two outings, a six-inning, three-run jaunt against Miami and a truncated 5 1/3 in Milwaukee that included back-to-back-to-back home runs in the sixth. Monday night was a reminder that the end of Scherzer’s road, at least for now, remains out of sight.
“I’m not broken.” Scherzer asserted after the game. “I wasn’t broken after the Milwaukee start, I didn’t need to reinvent the wheel. Just had to fine tune some things.”
San Diego Padres vs. New York Mets Highlights
Check out the best moments from the New York Mets’ 5-0 win over the San Diego Padres.
With offseason signing Justin Verlander out with a shoulder strain, José Quintana on the IL for another few months and Carlos Corrasco looking a diminished version of himself in the early going, the Mets have suddenly become quite reliant on their frontline ace just two weeks into the campaign. And though Verlander is set to return to make his Mets debut by the end of April, his IL stint serves as a reminder that both of New York’s frontline arms are… advanced in the years department.
For a pitcher like Scherzer, who has spent the last decade-plus violently contorting his body down big-league mounds like an electrocuted marionette, Father Time lurks, ever and always. There aren’t many 38 year old All-Star pitchers for a reason. Each additional underwhelming showing from Scherzer, his big stinker last October included, raises both eyebrows and questions about the inevitability of the end.
But unlike his disastrous postseason start, in which a perplexed Scherzer failed to verbalize why his trademark fastball lacked its usual bat-missing ride, the three-time Cy Young winner seemed much more in tune with his shortcomings after last week’s loss against the Brewers.
“Odds are [the issue] is just location. I gotta locate the ball better with two strikes and put myself in the position to get those outs.”
All four of Scherzer’s home runs allowed so far this season have either come with Scherzer ahead in the count or in two-strike counts. The three Milwaukee blasts were all breaking pitches that caught too much zone and ended up clanging a seat. The other barrels Scherzer had surrendered came mostly on in-zone fastballs middle-up, more than likely missed spots.
But on Monday night against the big-swinging Padres, a club fresh off a head-turning series win in Atlanta, he made the necessary adjustments, even if he wasn’t his best, sharpest self.
Scherzer admitted post-game that his fastball command still left something to be desired, stating that he’d prefer to have “just-misses” outside of the strike zone instead of over the heart of the plate.
That strategy avoided the game-defining gut-punch homers that have plagued Scherzer this season, but it also amplified his pitch count and chased him from the ballgame after just five frames. San Diego fouled off 25 pitches against the right-hander, working eight full counts against Scherzer in just 18 plate appearances.
But Mets manager Buck Showalter didn’t push the issue and cashed his chips once Scherzer reached 97 pitches, his last an electrifying swing-and-miss heater by Austin Nola after a well-battled 11-pitch at-bat.
Unfixed, Scherzer’s shaky fastball command could lead to more high pitch counts and put too much strain on a bullpen already seriously weakened by Edwin Díaz’s season-ending injury, but that’s a problem for another day. Thankfully for Scherzer, a quartet of relievers kept San Diego runless over its final four chances on Monday.
For now, the Mets ace will take incremental progress.
Jake Mintz, the louder half of @CespedesBBQ is a baseball writer for FOX Sports. He played college baseball, poorly at first, then very well, very briefly. Jake lives in New York City where he coaches Little League and rides his bike, sometimes at the same time. Follow him on Twitter at @Jake_Mintz.
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