Morning Mets Notes: A Tough Break for Johan Santana

As if I could start this post acting like no major news broke last night about Johan Santana. To give you a quick recap, Santana underwent an MRI, which revealed a probable tear in his surgically repaired left shoulder, and he’s likely lost for the season.
June 8, 2012; Bronx, NY, USA; New York Yankees second baseman Robinson Cano rounds the bases in the background as New York Mets pitcher Johan Santana stands on the field at Yankee Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Tim Farrell/The Star-Ledger via USA TODAY Sports
This is incredibly unfortunate news for someone as competitive as Santana, and I provided my opinion on the site last night. Some of his Mets teammates took to twitter to provide their reaction to the ace’s injury, all very sorry to see one of their brothers go down with yet another very serious injury. Chris McShane of Amazin’ Avenue made the interesting observation that although Johan had a very successful career as a starting pitcher, his arm has only been able to take that pounding for 9 years (his age-25 to age-34 season).
On to how Terry Collins will handle this with regard to the starting rotation, Jeremy Hefner will step in as the team’s 5th starter for longer than originally anticipated. He’s still doing fine after being hit in the elbow on Tuesday, and Adam Rubin reports he’ll probably get on the mound once more in Florida for an inning or two before they had north to start the season. Sandy Alderson re-iterated in his conference call with reporters last night that they will not rush Zack Wheeler to the Big Leagues, and they will call him up when he’s ready.
As usual, Danny Abriano kept us current with the most pertinent news and notes regarding the Mets yesterday. Bobby Valentine is officially joining the SNY crew this season, as Bobby V. will be an in-studio analyst before and after games 12 to 15 times in 2013. David Wright played five innings in a minor league game while New York was playing the Nats, but has voiced his desire to play with the Big League club tomorrow. So, he’s obviously feeling healthy.
The Mets traveled to Viera to take on Bryce Harper and the Washington Nationals, and the defending NL East champions beat the Amazins, 5-1. Domingo Tapia got the start yesterday, and after looking good in the first inning, started to unravel in the second. However, that’s to be expected of a pitcher that hasn’t pitched in Double-A yet. The big story was seeing Daniel Murphy make his Grapefruit League debut, going 1-for-3 with a broken bat single on the first pitch he saw from Gio Gonzalez. Get your Rising Apple recap right here.
Yesterday on Rising Apple, Rich Sparago talked about the acquisition of John Buck and how there is potential for him to make a big impact before Travis d’Arnaud makes his way to Flushing. Our 2013 MLB season preview series finished up, as we all voted for the key postseason awards. Sam Maxwell reminded us to catch the latest edition of The Rising Apple Report, which included a preview of the 2013 Miami Marlins.
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