WASHINGTON, D.C. – Chris Bassitt, after his final spring start last week, expressed both confidence and reassurance in the Mets rotation just days after their top aces sustained injuries. On Saturday, he has the opportunity to back up his words with his arm.
Bassitt is gearing up to make his Mets debut on Saturday against the Nationals at Nationals Park. His wife, two-year-old daughter, and parents will be traveling from Ohio to the Nation’s Capital to watch Bassitt take the mound for his new team for the first time.
“Of course there are nerves because it’s a new team and you want to put your best foot forward,” Bassitt said on Friday. “But overall, I feel good.”
His last time out, Bassitt allowed four runs in five innings to the Marlins on April 3. He stretched out to 90 pitches, so he should be able to pitch as long as Buck Showalter and the Mets need him to in the third game of a four-game opening series against the Nationals.
Bassitt was a first-time All-Star in 2021, recording a 3.15 ERA and posting the best win-loss percentage (.750) in the American League with a 12-4 record for the Athletics. He’s issued less than one home run per nine innings for each of the last two seasons, and will now try to limit the long ball against a new division in the National League.
Despite all the changes headed his way – including facing the Nationals for the first time in his eight-year career on Saturday – what he’s seen from the rest of the Mets rotation in Taijuan Walker, Carlos Carrasco, Tylor Megill, and of course, Max Scherzer, has convinced him that the Mets can survive at least the first two months of the season, maybe more, without the best pitcher in baseball.
“The old saying is, ‘If you don’t like what’s going on, give it a week and then everything’s changed.’ We’ll be perfectly fine,” Bassitt said after Jacob deGrom learned he would be shut down for up to four weeks. The 33-year-old said, if the Mets are that reliant on deGrom, then they don’t have a very good team put together in the first place.
At least in part, Bassitt was right about the landscape changing in one week. Already, Scherzer, who was battling hamstring tightness, recovered in a few days and made his Mets debut on Friday. Bassitt, the team’s No. 3 starter, is up next.
PETE REBOUNDS
The key words for Pete Alonso so far this season are: bounce back. Just like he did a month ago, after getting T-boned in a horrifying car crash, he returned to work the next day and participated in a full workout with his team. On Thursday, Alonso was drilled by a Mason Thompson hit by pitch that plunked his shoulder and helmet. The next day, he returned to the Mets lineup against the Nationals.
Alonso sported a swollen and bloody lip after the game, following his 40th career hit by pitch, but he was thrilled that he had all of his teeth. In an Instagram post, Alonso wrote: “Why spend thousands on lip injections when you can get this look for FREE by getting hit in the mouth by a 97-mph fastball?”
Mets manager Buck Showalter believed it was important for the first baseman to get back in the lineup on Friday, rather than giving him a day to take it easy, so he can step in the box and see live pitching again. Alonso, too, told Showalter on Thursday that he wanted to be back in there the following night.
“I knew how much he needed to play and wanted to play today,” Showalter said.
OUCH
The Mets were hit by a pitch three times on Opening Day, picking up right where they left off in 2021. Overall, the Amazin’s were plunked 94 times last year, which ranked fourth in the majors and third in the
National League. Since 2018, the Mets have been hit by 310 pitches, the most in the majors in that span.
“It’s dangerous,” Showalter said. “If he (the pitcher) doesn’t have command, you can’t let him pitch in there, or you can’t let him make your club.”
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