A Mets Miracle: Santana’s no-hitter

Johan Santana finally broke the New York Mets’ no-hitter hoodoo on Friday night.

It had been a long running joke, not a funny one from the Mets’ perspective, that no player had ever pitched a no-hitter for the team. It seemed obligatory to mention this fact whenever a no-hitter was thrown, especially when Mets old boy Phil Humber etched his name into the history books with a perfect game earlier this season.

Now, it is only the San Diego Padres who will have to face those jibes.

Santana’s effort included the standard highlight reel defensive play that seems to be a part of all no-hitter bids. Left fielder Mike Baxter made a spectacular catch in the seventh inning that resulted in him smashing into the outfield wall and needing to leave the game injured.

Santana also benefited from an incorrect call on a ball down the left-field line by former Met Carlos Beltran. It was called foul by umpire Adrian Johnson but had actually clipped the line and should have been ruled a fair ball. Andres Galarraga – he of the ‘perfect game’ that was blown by umpire Jim Joyce on what should have been the final out – will probably not be impressed if anyone tries to tell him that this goes to prove umpiring decisions even out over time.

The one negative – leaving aside Johnson’s incorrect call – was the career-high number of pitches that Santana threw as a result of completing the no-hitter.

Terry Collins was a surprising choice as the Mets’ new manager prior to the 2011 season and I’ve been very impressed by the way that he has handled his team so far. If Santana does break down in the coming weeks then Collins will be under a lot of scrutiny for not taking his pitcher out of the game and he acknowledged this in his post-game comments.

Collins summed up his position by stating in exhausted tones that “I just couldn’t take him out”.

On reflection, I think Collins was right. This wasn’t a case of a manager recklessly, blindly pushing his pitcher to the abyss. He knew exactly what was at stake and what the risks were and was agonising over what the correct decision should be. It’s easy to sit here on the outside – particularly if Santana does lose effectiveness or suffers an injury in the weeks ahead – and say that he should have been pulled, but Collins would never have lived that down and at the first period of an extended run of bad form, he would have been placed under unbearable pressure by the fans and media that would have made his position as manager untenable.

Whether that’s fair or logical doesn’t really matter, he’d be on the unemployment line with his name changed to ‘Terry Collins, who took Johan Santana out of a game when he was pitching a no-hitter …” in every report for the rest of his life.

The Mets have started this season well but it will be tough for them to make it to the postseason and Santana then has one year left on his current contract, followed by a $25m club option for 2014 that is very unlikely to be picked up (not at that price, at least). Taking Santana out after eight innings in an attempt to increase the chances of him giving the Mets plenty of innings this year and next carries a decent amount of value from the analytic point of view, but Collins wouldn’t get any credit for it and clearly it’s quite possible that Santana will miss time with an injury or two over the rest of his current contract irrespective of this one outing.

So Collins’ claim that “I just couldn’t take him out” holds true to me.

On to Saturday’s early games, with all times in BST.

18.07 Boston at Toronto (Doubront – Drabek) *ESPN America
19.10 Oakland at Kansas City (McCarthy – Hochevar)

21.05 Atlanta at Washington (Beachy – Strasburg)
21.05 Miami at Philadelphia (Nolasco – Hamels)
21.10 Seattle at Chicago White Sox (Noesi – Floyd)
21.10 St. Louis at NY Mets (Lynn – Dickey)
21.10 LA Dodgers at Colorado (Harang – Nicasio) *ESPN America
21.10 Baltimore at Tampa Bay (Matusz – Hellickson)

Gavin Floyd and the White Sox will attempt to make it ten wins in a row today, whilst the A’s are desperately trying to avoid falling to their tenth consecutive loss.  The pitching match-ups in Philadelphia and New York certainly catch the eye as well.

The Braves and Nationals had their game last night postponed due to rain and while that would have been a major disappointment to ticket holders, it’s worked out well for us in the UK. Stephen Strasburg will pitch today instead while the Braves will go with Brandon Beachy, who has been their most effective starting pitcher so far this season. Mike Morse should make his season debut for the Nats after spending a couple of months on the Disabled List and the Braves are likely to hand a Major League debut to Andrelton Simmons.

Simmons was a contender for the Braves’ vacancy at shortstop heading into Spring Training and every time I saw him on MLB.TV he greatly impressed with his fielding ability. He has an absolute cannon for an arm and his early returns at the plate this year in Double-A have been encouraging, so there’s hope that he will at least be able to hold his own with the bat in his rookie year while providing lots of value with his excellent glove work. Add on that he’s from Curacao and therefore eligible for the Netherlands National Team and yesterday’s rain-out could be a blessing for European baseball fans hopefully getting a chance to watch Simmons’ Major League debut at a convenient time today.

All of these games are available to watch live via the MLB.TV subscription at MLB.com.  ESPN America is showing two games this evening, as stated above.  The full schedule for today’s games can be found on MLB.com.