Iron Man Peterson

All hail David Peterson, who lasted seven-and-two-thirds innings in the game that directly followed the Mets playing thirteen. On its face, that scans as a highly commendable effort, especially since the Mets won Peterson’s Saturday night start over the Dodgers, 5-2, but consider the context and ramp up your commendations. The face of contemporary baseball makes a pained expression at the suggestion that as many as thirteen innings would ever be played, what with phony-baloney ghost runners populating second base and the MLB-mandated intention of getting ties unbroken ASAP. And seven-and-two-thirds? In the mid-2020s, that rates as something out of the age of Iron Man McGinnity.

Iron Man McGinnity would likely scoff at the comparison. Joe “Iron Man” McGinnity completed 314 starts in a career that spanned 1899 to 1908 and led his league in innings pitched four separate times, tossing more than 300 innings in nine different seasons and more than 400 in two of them. His 314 complete games still rank as thirty-third all time.

David “Petey” Peterson isn’t challenging any of that, but he was iron enough for a staff whose eight relievers each saw action the night before. That’s eight relievers, which doesn’t even take into account all the starters who didn’t pitch. Iron Man McGinnity would have shaken his head in his dismay. His right arm might have fallen off while doing so, but he had his personal experience, and he seemed to have his everlasting convictions drawn from them.

The David “Petey” Peterson of his time.

Remarking on the use of mere ten-man pitching staffs in 1926, McGinnity couldn’t believe that iron men were no longer iron men the way they were when he was Iron Man: “This policy has had a psychological effect upon the pitchers. They have been influenced into the belief that they should not have to work without a long rest and that they can’t be effective without that rest.”

Balancing rest and effectiveness came into play after Friday’s 98-minute rain delay limited dependable Griffin Canning to two-and-two-thirds (McGinnity would probably scoff at that, too), when Carlos Mendoza saw fit to use every bullpen arm he had over the succeeding ten-and-two-thirds. One was left to wonder which modern-day manager between Mendy and Dave Roberts would have thrown the white flag rather than dip into his starter reserves had the game gone fourteen or, heaven forefend, fifteen.

Baseball games are designed to get extra innings the hell over with since 2020. It’s a fraud and a travesty and, for that matter, a fravesty. But that’s how it is, so when you get a thirteen-inning game for the first time since the last decade, and you are determined to use no reliever any longer than two innings (even though you don’t have to bat for any of them anymore, speaking of designated fravesties…no offense to new DH Jared Young), that’s how thirteen innings becomes an unfathomable burden on your pitching depth rather than just one of those things that add up now and then.

If we are to accept the notion that a thirteen-inning game today is the equivalent of no less than a seventeen-inning game from when the only way to have a runner on second was to have him reach base by his skills/wits/luck, then Peterson coming through to save Mendoza from plundering his bullpen two consecutive nights was an awesome achievement. David gave up only two runs early and set the stage for Edwin Diaz in his lately unhittable incarnation to do the rest. Brett Baty and Juan Soto — kindred spirits within the 22 club — provided most of the offense, and the Dodgers were summarily knocked off their defending world champions perch. We now trail an extended version of last year’s NLCS five games to three, even it’s not healthy to think of it in those grudgy terms.