Mets thriving amid early-season injuries with next man up mentality

In the manager handbook, somewhere after learning to take it a game at a time and before not burning bridges on the day you are fired, is the part about keeping a steely resolve when a key player goes down. 

Cliches to use are about holding the fort and seizing opportunity. 

Buck Showalter is an expert on the metaphorical handbook — plus the actual rulebook as he proved again Sunday by having his team prepared to handle a rare play during the sixth inning at Citi Field that nullified Arizona’s attempt to appeal that Dominic Smith left too early tagging up from third (he didn’t leave early). 

Showalter certainly offered all the stiff-upper-lip standard fare when the Mets found out just before the season that Jacob deGrom would miss at least two months with a shoulder injury. But it is Jacob deGrom, arguably the best pitcher on the third planet from the sun. Down deep you are hoping for competence in his absence, praying not to have your season overwhelmed from the outset. 

Where would the Mets manager and management sign up to just survive and advance? 

Yet, 10 games and two turns through the rotation into the 2022 season, Tylor Megill and David Peterson have done this: Thrived and enhanced. 

“They have been good for our momentum, they have kind of given us an ego boost with how they have pitched,” J.D. Davis said. 

There will be no Cy Youngs given out for two times through the rotation, but if the award was handed out in mid-April, Megill might win the NL version. And on Sunday, filling in for the injured Taijuan Walker, Peterson delivered 4 ¹/₃ shutout innings in a 5-0 triumph over Arizona. 

That gave the Mets eight straight starts allowing one or no runs, which is tied for the franchise record, according to the Elias Sports Bureau. The Mets’ rotation has a 1.07 ERA, which according to Sportradar is the best for any team in the first 10 games of a season since the earned run became an official stat in 1913. 

And if that 1.07 ERA kind of looks similar to something, you might remember that deGrom had a 1.08 ERA after his final start last year on July 7. 

This is like Genesis getting better when Peter Gabriel left or “Cheers” improving when Shelley Long walked out of the bar. The Mets’ greatest concern was rotation depth. Then deGrom went down, Max Scherzer had a hiccup with a hamstring issue and now Walker is going to miss a few rotation turns with right shoulder bursitis. 

The post-lockout trade for Chris Bassitt has been a Mets godsend, and so has Carlos Carrasco’s surgically repaired elbow. 

Still, because their farm system does not have upper-level rotation quality and because Joey Lucchesi is rehabbing from Tommy John surgery, Megill, Peterson and Trevor Williams are pretty much the rotation break glass in case of fire. Either they do the job or the Mets are in 9-1-1 territory in April. 

“Our depth has been tested early,” Showalter said. “Very quietly [Peterson] and Tylor have really stepped up to take some of the [onus] off of guys like Scherzer and Carlos and Bassitt. It bodes well for us down the road.” 

The quality of opponents has helped the Mets win their first three series. Washington, Philadelphia and Arizona are a combined 11-19 and the D-minus D’backs are the worst of the group. Arizona can’t field very well and hit even worse — Ketel Marte’s .200 average was the best in Sunday’s lineup. But if you watched the Yankees lose two of three in Baltimore over the weekend, then you know you better fatten up on bad teams, like the Mets did in opening 7-3. Because the good ones are coming. 

San Francisco, tied for the majors’ best record at 7-2 after an MLB-best-107 wins last year, will begin a four-game series Monday at Citi Field. This is a Giant step up in opponent, a better early gauge of where these Mets are. Megill gets the opener and the lineup is still expected to be without COVID-sidelined Mark Canha and Brandon Nimmo. 

So far, though, the Mets are doing well with the next man up. They took two of three from the Diamondbacks by winning the rubber match on a blustery Sunday. Peterson, throwing harder than normal, and four relievers teamed for a shutout. The Mets used base-path aggression to break a scoreless tie with a three-run sixth inning and Pete Alonso’s third homer, all as a DH, in the seventh removed any chance of an Arizona comeback. 

“Peterson was the key to the game,” Showalter said as he left the podium following his postgame comments to reporters. 

For 10 games, the Mets have faced their greatest fear by more than surviving and advancing because when it comes to the rotation, Megill and Peterson are thriving and enhancing.