The Matt Harvey Mess

"Pitchers recovering from Tommy John surgery should limit innings to 180-185." - Dr. James Andrews, the man who invented Tommy John surgery "Pitchers recovering from Tommy John surgery should shut up and act like a man.' - Asshole Sports Radio Caller


Whom would you listen to?

Matt Harvey is doing exactly the right thing here for his own future and the future of the franchise. He's not being greedy or selfish, and even if he were, can you blame him? Stay healthy and pretty much assure yourself a huge contract or ignore doctor's advice and risk not only all that money but also everything you've worked for your entire life.

Now there are a couple problems here, but I don't know exactly who deserves how much of the blame.
First of all, why wasn't a clear and coherent plan made from spring training? Were the Mets expecting to be out of it by September at which point they could just shut him down? Was Harvey suddenly feeling tired and asking for time off?
We'll probably never know but I would suspect the Mets are more worthy of blame than Harvey.

And those idiotic Mets fans who want him traded are exactly the fans I fear the team is listening to when doing or almost doing things like signing Cuddyer or trading Flores and Wheeler for Carlos Gomez.

Matt Harvey is the centerpiece of what could be one of the greatest rotations we've seen in a long time, if they stay health and stay together.
The Mets need to do everything they can to protect him even if it means lessening their chances to win a few regular season games.

But come playoff time I think Harvey and the Mets would be willing to take their chances and push themselves 15-20 innings past the doctor prescribed limit, if that's ok with all the doctors in the stands at CitiField.

3000 Words

Maria Kang, MILF, pissed off a lot of mommies with her in-your-face boobies, abs and slogan.

Digger Phelps plays Mother Ginger in "The Nutcracker." This is the 6th year he's done this.

Is Matt Harvey picking Anne V's nose?

I'm Not a Doctor

Matt Harvey has a torn ligament in his elbow. Tommy John surgery is the usual avenue to repair such an injury, but since it is only a partial tear, Harvey has decided to try to rehab it, instead of opting for Tommy John surgery.
This totally sucks. And we want to kick ourselves in the asses and say "typical Mets, cursed franchise" and I might agree with that. We have had Tom Seaver who was great. Gooden who was great and derailed his career with drugs, and now Matt Harvey.
Of course the fear is that he will struggle through one or more injury-plagued seasons before needing the surgery anyway, so why not just have it now?
I guess the thinking is that he can strengthen the muscles around the ligament to prevent a tear. And even if a tear is inevitable, maybe putting it off, would allow a couple more good years before Tommy John surgery and maybe lengthen his career at the back end was well.
And since Dr. James Andrews signed off on this, I'm willing to try this approach. The fear of course is that he will rehab and then tear it sometime next season, costing him 2014 and 2015.
There is a strong reason to believe Harvey will never be the same again, but there are also many examples of guys who came back as good or better.
Adam Wainwright and Steven Strasburg both had the operation in 2011. Chris Carpenter had it in 2007 and came back strong for 3 seasons before getting hurt again. AJ Burnett, Anibal Sanchez and Francisco Liriano are other pitcher who have had success post-Tommy John.

Harvey does not seem to be handling the injury, and the scrutiny over his personal medical decision, very well. Here's his curt interview with Dan Patrick.



I'm very familiar with these type of interviews and the arrangement is exactly how Dan Patrick described it. In this case Qualcomm pays Matt Harvey to be its spokesman. Matt Harvey does interviews to promote the product, but the agreement (and usually it's unspoken, as the producer explained) is that the player will do a real interview about all reasonable topics and the last question or two will be about what is being promoted.
Dan Patrick handled it well, Matt Harvey did not. He later apologized on Twitter as he realized his behavior did damage to himself and to Qualcomm.
I'm sure Harvey's image can recover from this, but can his elbow?

Maybe They Should Have Spent a Little More Time Looking at His Face

Jimmy Fallon (underrated show by the way) thought it would be funny to send Mets pitcher Matt Harvey around the city to ask people questions about Matt Harvey.



I know for 100% certainty that I would be able to spot Matt Harvey on a street, even in a crowd. How these people, even the ones who saw the naked ESPN pictures, couldn't recognize him is beyond me. Maybe, like JLeary, they spent too much time look at other parts of the pictures, and not Harvey's face.

Matt Harvey Naked

Mets pitcher Matt Harvey agreed to appear in ESPN Magazine's The Body Issue, which every year features naked athletes, their bodies obscured only by the tools of their trade.
I really have no opinion on it, I think it's a desperate ploy to get attention for their magazine, not an artistic statement about the beauty of the human form. I don't think looking at the dudes for say three seconds automatically makes you gay. And I don't think the chicks they've had in here have even looked that great, even though many of them are very hot in other contexts.
So here it is Matt Harvey fans, our ace for the next 10 years, with no clothes on:

Maybe they should have had him pose with his girlfriend Anne V.

She's done some similar modeling

The Plan is Working

The intelligent Mets fans who read this blog have been buying what I have been selling since 2009 as the team's only path to contention: get rid of veterans, stockpile a bunch of young talent, develop those players and then sign them to long-term deals.
It will be a long painful process but we are starting to see the plan bear fruit.
Matt Harvey is 4-0 with a 0.93 ERA and will hopefully become a top of the rotation starter for many years to come.

He may never be as good as Stephen Strasburg (whom I predict will be an all-time great) but I expect him to be good enough to battle with him for a long time. If this ever does become a rivalry, the first chapter was written Friday night when Harvey outdueled Strasburg and the Mets fans noticed:



"Harvey's Better! (clap -- clap -- clap clap clap) Harvey's Better! (clap -- clap -- clap clap clap)"
Doesn't this feel great Mets fans? To have one of our own young guys come up and take the league by storm like this. Wheeler is on the way, D'Arnaud is on the way. Harvey is here. There's hope Mets fans, and it sounds great.