Mets' Carlos Carrasco breaks finger in weight-room accident, ending his season
Mets starting pitcher Carlos Carrasco walks to the dugout after being taken out of the game during the second inning against the Angels in an MLB game at Citi Field on Saturday. Credit: Kathleen Malone-Van Dyke
WASHINGTON — Carlos Carrasco’s season and perhaps his Mets tenure is over after he broke his right pinky finger during a weight-room mishap, the team announced Tuesday.
He already has had surgery to insert a pin into the finger, Buck Showalter said, after suffering the injury Sunday. While lifting weights following a routine bullpen session, Carrasco put down a 50-pound dumbbell that then fell on his hand.
“It was an accident,” Showalter said. “He set it down. It flipped. Nasty.”
Thus ended prematurely the worst season of Carrasco’s 14-year career. He had a 6.80 ERA, the highest in franchise history with at least 70 innings pitched, and 1.70 WHIP in 20 starts.
The Mets had temporarily demoted him to the bullpen, though they never used him in relief. Carrasco was set to return to the rotation Wednesday against the Nationals.
Rookie righthander Jose Butto will pitch in his place. Righthanded reliever Sam Coonrod returned from Triple-A Syracuse to take Carrasco’s roster spot.
“Certainly feel for him and didn’t want his season to end this way,” pitching coach Jeremy Hefner said. “The irony of it all is he threw a really good bullpen right before the incident, so I felt like we were on a good path trying to hit on some command stuff.
“He had a really good year last year, so the expectation was for him to repeat that. That’s hard to do no matter who you are. Certainly wanted him to pitch better and thought that he could’ve pitched better, but command evaded him a little bit this year.”
Command — a pitcher’s ability to locate pitches where he wants within the strike zone — was a problem all season for Carrasco. After first-pitch strikes, for example, batters still managed to hit .289 with a .834 OPS against him. Last year, those numbers were .241 and .640.
“He was wild in the zone a lot,” Showalter said. “If you go back through his outings, he’d be 0-and-2 . . . and throw a flat slider and a split that didn’t really have finish on it. Try to go down and away and be middle-in. It’s pretty much a command thing.”
Despite the poor numbers as a 36-year-old, Carrasco, who is a free agent after the season, does not intend for this injury to end his career. He had been telling people — even before he got hurt — that he wanted to keep pitching in 2024 and beyond.
Showalter spoke as if that was a given. The Mets said pitchers typically require 4-6 weeks to recover from this injury, so Carrasco should be looking at a practically normal offseason throwing-and- workouts-wise.
“By the time he’s ready to throw, he should be OK,” Showalter said. “He’s doing well. They think he should be fine for next year.”
Hefner said: “Hopefully he can get past this finger injury and have a good offseason and continue to play.”
Whether that comes with the Mets, though, is uncertain. Carrasco joined the organization with Francisco Lindor in the January 2021 blockbuster trade with Cleveland. His numbers: three seasons, four stays on the injured list, 61 starts, 19-20 record, 5.21 ERA, 1.46 WHIP.
“He’s going to pitch again next year for somebody,” Showalter said. “We’ll see if it’s for us or not. We haven’t gotten there with those decisions yet.”
Hefner believed it would happen with somebody, though, if Carrasco can fix what plagued him in recent months.
“The thing that I have talked to him about is 'your velo has come down a little bit'. It’s normal age regression velo-wise. But the changeup is still a viable pitch, the slider is still a viable pitch and the curveball at times. He can throw the sinker a little bit more,” Hefner said.
“It’s command of the baseball. Command of that stuff will allow him to play one, two, three, four more years.”
Tim Healey is the Mets beat writer for Newsday. Born on Long Island and raised in Connecticut, Tim has previously worked for the South Florida Sun Sentinel, the Boston Globe and MLB.com. He is also the author of “Hometown Hardball,” a book about minor league baseball in the northeast.
