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| © New York Mets 2013 John Buck and Matt Harvey |
By Thomas Scherrer
You listen to enough people around the shoreline of Connecticut and swore they once saw him as a teenager strike out 15 in Groton; then promptly walked out to the Connecticut River and walked on it. Others also would gladly tell you that it was simply a myth of a man who was too arrogant and too young to know better. I've had the privilege of working with a older man for close to two years in Doug Carlson. He's a baseball fan first. Rare to find a 63-year-old man deeply involved in a fantasy baseball keeper league. He argues it keeps him in touch with all the players in the game he loves the most; keeping tabs on rising young arms like Gerrit Cole and Jarrod Parker, as well as keeping in touch with the player he considered the best player he ever saw in the famous Cape Cod League in Buster Posey. He's been trying to pull off a three-for-one deal to get rid of the chronically injured Clay Buchholz for two years and drafted Zack Wheeler two years ago as a sign of the future for what the prospect of...well, a prospect could bring. He swears he's not obsessed with it. I don't disagree, but I know the real reason: it keeps an old man young. Baseball does that to men of a certain age. It tries to call them back to a better day, one when they were younger and more virile. When bones didn't creak and moan like a broken-down need. When the future seemed limitless and full of opportunity. For Carlson, you can argue his tour of Vietnam stole some of that innocence and he's always been looking to reclaim it. Or you can claim he's got no other Damn thing to do.
But he never outright loved the myth of that young man. Heard too much about the arrogance and petulance of a pitching prospect. Perhaps he thought to himself that he needed to be less impressed of the local myth as if to not lose himself in the man that in the span of 18 months would become a prospect-turned Major Leaguer-turned rising phenom-turned staff ace-turned National League All-Star starting pitcher. He didn't want to lose himself in Matt Harvey like I did.
Harvey shifted the paradigm of a star-crossed franchise, always living in the shadow of their cross-town rivals. Every five or so days this season, the story that led baseball was centered around the team in Flushing, with the 24-year-old from New London, Connecticut flashing his right arm to the sky, baseball in hand, delivering it 60 feet, 6 inches to a batter whose odds of success were scant to begin with only becoming improbable once they saw what Harvey threw at them. Hitters became vanquished foes-helpless on that particular night, hoping that maybe Harvey's team wouldn't score any runs (happened) and that they could spell the myth enough to dispose of him and claim victory against lesser men (also happened). But to some who support the team Harvey plays for, the win or loss was irrelevant, as much as the performance was. Met fans who get it know what we've been witnesses to: a once in a generation ace, not afraid of New York and it's crush of what celebrity might bring. But most don't see that. They are seeing the youth wasted on a lousy organization, with an equally lousy, if not apathetic fanbase (yes, most Met fans-you have been horrible these last few years) that is uncaring and ultimately waiting for the other shoe to drop.
Perhaps now, that shoe has dropped.
On Monday, August 26th, 2013, the Mets silent guardian-a man whose fans need, but don't deserve based off their actions-walked into the New York Mets press room around 4:30 in the afternoon and sat in front of the media to announce he has partially torn his UCL in that magical right arm. The hopes and promises of a championship future spearheaded by the dynamic duo of Harvey and Wheeler for the moment have been set aside as Harvey possibly awaits a degree most pitchers have, yet don't want: a BS in Ligament Replacement at Tommy John University. A shock for many who thought that the Automatic Man, with the perfect pitching mechanics would never fall prey to the deadliest injury in baseball. So proves that the most violent act in sports can get even the most sound of deliveries, with just a single moment. For now, Matt Harvey, the Real Deal, or The Dark Knight of Gotham, or The Franchise 2.0 will rest and hope that surgery is not the answer. Sadly, history points in the other direction. An eighteen month journey through rehab, could with torture, doubt, some more torture, some more doubt, and hopefully, success. With success comes a return of hope and faith to the Flushing Faithful; a return to the masses that may truly appreciate what they have in front of them.
Here's to The Dark Knight Rising.
©8th Floor Poet 2013
