Remembering Mets History (2013) Matt Harvey Starts the Season At 4-0 with 25 Strike outs

In 2013 Matt Harvey was the Mets top attraction. The Rookie had a fantastic start to the season winning his first four starts of the year, giving some excitement to the Mets fans.

Wednesday April 3rd: Matt Harvey started the second game of the season taking on the San Diego Padres at Citi Field. Harvey started out the game striking out the first two batters. In the second inning he struck out the final two batters & had four strike outs thru two innings. 

In the bottom of the 2nd, Lucas Duda hit a two run HR to start the Mets scoring.

In the 3rd inning, he notched another strike out & retired the first none batters in a row. 

In the 4th, Everth Cabrera led off with a base hit, then Harvey picked him off at first base. He
issued a two out walk but got Carlos Quentin to ground into an inning ending double play. 

In the bottom of the 4th, Harveys battery mate John Buck hit a two run HR to make it a 4-0 lead. In the 5th the Mets sent nine men to the plate, with Ike Davis hitting the third Mets HR of the game, a two-run shot. David Wright added an RBI double & John Buck drove in his third run of the game with an RBI single.

Matt Harvey retired the next ten batters in a row. With one out in the 6th inning, Harvey struck out Camern Maybin & Andrew Cashner. To start the 7th, he struck out Everth Cabrera & Will Veneable to give him four straight strike outs delighting the Citi Field fans. 

Harvey was done for the night, shutting out San Diego for seven innings allowing just one hit & walking two. He struck out ten batters in what was the first of his six double digit strike outs games on the season. Mets reliever Latroy Hawkins made it interesting giving up three runs in the 9th but the Mets went on to an 8-4 win.

Monday April 8th: In Matt Harvey's second start, the Mets were in Philadelphia taking on Roy Halladay & the Phils. The Mets were all over Halladay, knocking him up for seven runs with John Buck hitting his third HR of the season, a three-run shot. Ruben Tejada added a two-run single, with David Wright & Lucas Duda also having RBI hits.

After a leadoff walk, Harvey retired nine straight batters before giving up a double to Jimmy Rollins, a single to Chase Utley & sac Fly RBI to Ryan Howard. In the 5th, Harvey issued his second walk then struck out the next three Phillies. In the 6th he fanned Ryan Howard & Lance Nix in the 7th to total nine strike outs on the evening. 

Harvey went to 2-0 with a 0.64 ERA as the Mets rolled to a 7-2 victory.

Saturday April 13th: On chilly afternoon in Minnesota, the Twins hosted the Mets as Harvey made his third start of the season. Harvey started out the game striking out Aaron Hicks, then retired the next two batters. He struck out Justin Morneau to start the second, then issued a walk to Ryan Doumit. He then retired the next six in a row before issuing another walk in the 4th. He got Morneau to ground into a double play to end the inning.

In the top of the 5th, Marlon Byrd led off with a HR. The Mets then collected sin straight his, with RBIs from Colin Cowgill, Daniel Murphy & David Wright.

I the bottom of the 6th, Harver fanned Brian Dozier & Eduardo Escobar for his fifth & sixth strike outs. Harvey would go eight full innings on this night, allowing just one run on two hits, taking the victory.

In his first three starts, Matt was 3-0 with a 0.82 ERA, he had struck out 25 batters in 22 innings & walked six, becoming one of the top pitchers in the league.

Harvey became just the third pitcher in MLB history to have 25 or more strike outs in their first three games of the season. He was now the second Mets pitcher to achieve the 25 K feat in the first three games to start season as well.

In 1970 Nolan Ryan also accomplished the milestone as a member of the New York Mets. In his first three starts, Nolan Ryan was 2-1 with a 0.69 ERA, collecting 28 strike outs in 26 innings but walked an incredible 19 batters as well. 

The young Ryan was still two years away from having his career take off, as he went on to blow hitters away in the American League with five 300 plus K seasons from 1972-1977. Ryan would lead his league in K's 11 times, nine times in the AL & then twice more when returning to the NL. He ended his career with an All-time best 5714 strike outs.

Friday April 19th: Back at Citi Field, a crowd of 26,675 came out to see Harvey take on Stephen Strasburg & the Washington Nationals. Harvey started the game striking out Dernad Spam, then rolling thru the 1st inning. 

In the bottom of the 1st, the Mets Jordany Valdespin reached on an error &eventually scored on a wild pitch from Strasburg. John Buck added an RBI hit to make it 2-1. In the bottom of the 6th, Ike Davis & Lucas Duda both went deep with solo HRs giving Havey now known as "the Dark Knight" a 4-0 lead. The dup would both add homer again in the home 8th inning.

Harvey would allow just one run an RBI single to Chad Tracy. He gave up just four hits struck out seven batters leaving the game with a 4-1 lead. 

Matt Harvey's incredible start to the season had him at 4-0 with a 0.93 ERA, with 32 strike outs in 29 innings pitched. Opposing batters were hitting just .108 against him.

Harvey would go on to start the All-Star Game for the National League, in the game played at Citi Field. It was just the second time an All-Star Game was hosted by the Mets. In 1964 the game was played at the new Shea Stadium.

But it all went bad in August when he tore his ulnar collateral ligament & needed Tommy John surgery, ending his season.