OCT. 11: Kristie Ackert of the New York Daily News reports that shortstop Asdrubal Cabrera will not require offseason surgery, either. Cabrera met with doctors following the Mets’ elimination from the Wild Card game for an evaluation of a knee injury that he played through for the majority of the season, and surgery was reportedly a possible outcome. Instead, he’ll take an additional two weeks of rest before beginning his offseason regime, which will be monitored by medical officials over the course of the winter to ensure that his left patellar tendon is properly healed.
Cabrera will play out the second season of a two-year, $18.5MM contract with the Mets in 2017, and the Mets also hold an affordable club option over his services for the 2018 campaign. That contract looks to be one of the offseason’s biggest bargains, in retrospect, as Cabrera batted .280/.336/.474 with 23 home runs, 30 doubles and a triple over the course of the season en route to a season that both Fangraphs and Baseball-Reference pegged at roughly three wins above replacement. He’ll earn $25MM over three years if that 2018 option is exercised next winter.
OCT. 10: Though it was revealed during the season that Noah Syndergaard had been diagnosed with a bone spur, he won’t require offseason surgery to correct the issue, per ESPNNewYork.com’s Adam Rubin (Twitter link). That has generally been the expectation since the news trickled out in late June.
It is certainly a good sign for the Mets that Syndergaard will enter spring camp next year after a normal winter. He ended up with only a modest increase in innings on the year. The 24-year-old ultimately tossed 190 2/3 innings after his appearance in the NLDS, but had already racked up 179 2/3 frames in 2015 (including his five Triple-A starts).
New York is no doubt hoping that the outstanding Syndergaard will not only remain in good health, but will be joined in that classification by his rotation mates. Steven Matz recently had his own, much more significant bone spur removed in a procedure recently. Jacob deGrom‘s season ended early when he checked in for a surgery in which his ulnar nerve was re-positioned. And, of course, Matt Harvey is the biggest question mark of all after undergoing a procedure to address thoracic outlet syndrome.
Syndergaard is now the unquestioned ace of the staff after posting a 2.60 ERA with 10.7 K/9 against 2.1 BB/9. While it seems reasonable to expect Matz and deGrom to line up behind him, the remainder of the rotation is a bit uncertain. Zack Wheeler is still an option but he hasn’t thrown since 2014 and hasn’t enjoyed a straightforward return from Tommy John surgery. Robert Gsellman and Seth Lugo both showed well in limited outings, but haven’t yet fully established themselves in the majors. The only Mets hurler who didn’t miss a start was 43-year-old Bartolo Colon, who spun 191 2/3 innings of 3.43 ERA ball, but he’s a free agent. Given the state of affairs, it wouldn’t be surprising to see the team move to keep him in the fold for a fourth-straight campaign.
Thor actually threw 200 innings in 2015, counting his postseason work. It further makes that point that the one positive from this year is that the big four go into 2017 with rested arms. If the narrative going into 2016 was how they would be diminished by their workload from the previous season, shouldn’t the narrative be the opposite now?
Not sure it works that way if they end the season on the DL
I don’t understand this. The bone spur surgery don’t pose much risk at he will likely have it grow and will need it taken out at some point why don’t now?
I agree it makes no sense, just have it done and get it over with
From my limited understanding of physiology, bone spurs aren’t always bad, they’re the body’s way of adapting to a repetitive motion (like throwing) and may not always need to be corrected. But of course I could be wrong.
I’ll set the over/under for innings from Noah/Harvey/Degrom/Matz/Wheeler at 650
Definitely under, no doubt about that.
650 seems reasonable. They’ll probably get close to 175 a piece from Syndergaard and at least one of the other 4. Then the other 3 would only need to pitch 100 innings a piece
Actually Noah threw 199 if that makes a difference lol. ((2015))
The two keys for the Mets next season is signing Cespedes and the health of their pitching. The Mets over pitched the young arms to get to the world series and they may have to pay for it I think that Matz and Harvey are the biggest question marks.
really? Wheeler hasn’t pitched in what, 2 years?
There are a couple of reasons why the Doctors may be reluctant to remove the spur. Remove too much bone,and the elbow will try and extend further than in the past causing stress on tendons supporting the elbow (Tommy John). Another reason is once a spur is removed or shaved down, the body tends to generate more spurs and the new one may cause more trouble than the one that was shaved down. A large percentage of pitchers in the ML have bone spurs. The spurs that are left behind are causing little to no structural damage to the joint. They might be causing inflammation in the joint that usually is controlled with anti inflammatories. The best surgery is always no surgery.
Completely agree with this. The only time I’ve seen players opting for surgery for bone spurs are when the spur is actually causing damage to the ligament. Having surgery just to have it can lead to other issues which could be worse than the spur.
This talented/injury prone group are starting to remind me of Generation K consisting of Bill Pulsipher, Jason Isringhausen and Paul Wilson. They where hyped and really good but all hurt with in 1 year.
that is an unbelievably terrible comparisson. Every one of the Mets current crop of starters has had good to excellent seasons. Generation K were terrible as starters, and 2/3 barely threw any MLB innings at all,
I agree with woodhead….only Jason Isringhausen of that group had success and that was as a closer….the other 2 were nothing more than 4th starters if that….the Mets group now all have had some success and are set to have productive careers….
BLASPHAMY!
Actually I see the point but Generation K never had the start that these youngsters did. As a wise man once said – potential means you haven’t done it yet
Pretty unfair comparison tbh… generation K never went to the World Series, and it’s not like these guys have been terrible. A few of them have been pretty good actually.