Via MLB.com’s Mike Petriello, Harvey threw his four hardest pitches of the season in terms of velocity on Monday, all in the 97.9-98.5 miles per hour range.
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They’re admittedly still searching for answers, with Collins citing Harvey’s unprecedented workload in 2015 – 216 innings, including four high-impact playoff starts – in his first year after 2014 Tommy John surgery. After a successful return past year from Tommy John surgery, he was coming off three straight losses in which he allowed 19 runs and 27 hits, and he struck out a career-low one last week at Washington. He called that “unacceptable”, saying that his emotions had gotten the better of him after repeatedly answering the same questions about his struggles.
Harvey – who took a ideal game into the seventh in his only previous start against the White Sox – retired the first 13 batters he faced before Shuck singled in the fifth. For a highly touted recruit who had pitched tremendously as a freshman and figured to be a top pick in the draft, this was a shock to the system. The early innings haven’t been an issue for Harvey. You can’t expect everybody to be ideal every time.
Harvey retired Todd Frazier on a foulout and J.B. Shuck on a grounder to escape trouble, Neil Walker homered off Jose Quintana on the second pitch in the bottom half of the seventh and the New York Mets beat Chicago 1-0 Monday to send the reeling White Sox to their seventh straight loss. “And that’s the Matt Harvey that we always knew”.
Sale said the last time he checked, Ventura had not given up any runs, made any errors and he is sitting in the dugout the entire game.
Harvey did catch one other significant break in addition to Flores’s double play and Cabrera’s bunt: He got a strikeout in the second inning on a pitch that hit Lawrie on the hand. “That was certainly what he did”.
The Mets would look like a very different team moving forward if Matt Harvey and Jacob deGrom return to pitching like their usual selves, and Harvey did so emphatically yesterday afternoon as the Mets beat the White Sox. Harvey ran into a bit of difficulty in the middle innings, including getting into a jam with runners on second and third with one out, but he managed to escape unscathed. It was by far his best outing of the year and was well timed as the Mets could only muster one run themselves.
“There are a lot of emotions”, Harvey said.
“When it’s 0-0 and you have a couple of runners on like that, you kind of think about the worst at that point when things haven’t been going that great”, Harvey said.
What was your decision after your last start not to talk to the media?
“It helps when you go out there and throw seven scoreless”, David Wright said. Recently, the Mets have been dealing with injuries and have seen star players struggle like they never have before in the blue and orange.
“This isn’t going to really mean anything unless I continue it”, said Harvey, who lowered his ERA from 6.08 to 5.37.
“Guy goes out there and throws a shutout and you’re able to give him that lead, especially when he’s coming out of the game after he throws (a) solid seven innings, it feels good”, Walker said.
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The next test for Harvey will be this weekend in Miami. Would Harvey, in a scoreless game, lose his composure and make a couple of mistakes against a unsafe American League lineup?
