Note: Keep it Going, Fernando Nieve
Fernando Nieve will make his fourth start of the season for the Mets tonight, when the team takes on the Brewers in Milwaukee at 7 pm.
Nieve is 3-0 with 1.48 ERA in his three starts for the Mets, during which he has 11 strike outs in 18.2 innings pitched.
In a report for the Star-Ledger, Andy McCullough quotes Nieve as saying, of his time in Houston where he struggled, “I was thinking about the minor leagues and all this stuff. Am I moving to the bullpen, the minor leagues or whatever? Now I’m more focused on pitching. I just worry about pitching and nothing else.”
…like i wrote following his last start, i’d be skeptical, but he’s 26… and so, it’s certainly possible, after hundreds of appearances between the majors and minors, he’s starting to figure it out, and that the Mets caught lightening in a bottle…
Nieve signed with the Astros in 1999 as a nondrafted free agent.
The Mets claimed him off waivers in March for $414,000.
…so far, he’s had serious command of all of his pitches, specifically his secondary stuff, which sets up that 95–mph fastball, which, if you notice, hitters always seem to be late on… he’s also pitching smart, pitching around dangerous hitters, and, as he said after the game, he’s not over-thinking things… eventually, advanced scouts will inform other teams what to do, but, for now, he’s been phenomenal… the key will be, once that happens, how will he adjust…
According to Elias Sports Bureau, courtesy of ESPN.com, Nieve is the sixth pitcher to win his first three starts for the Mets and the third to do so while posting an ERA under 2.00. The others were Bob Ojeda in 1986 and Pedro Astacio in 2002.
