NEW YORK — Matt Harvey, battered and beleaguered, walked into the New York Mets media room at Citi Field on Tuesday afternoon with his head down and sat in front of the microphone. ADVERTISING NEW YORK — Matt Harvey, battered
NEW YORK — Matt Harvey, battered and beleaguered, walked into the New York Mets media room at Citi Field on Tuesday afternoon with his head down and sat in front of the microphone.
He had just finished apologizing to his teammates and his coaches, speaking emotionally for about 10 minutes behind the closed doors of the clubhouse and addressing his failure to show up for Saturday’s game, an act that led to a three-game suspension.
Now the 28-year-old Harvey had to deliver an apology for the public to hear. And he did, without offering any alibis for his actions.
“I’m extremely embarrassed,” Harvey said at one point.
“It’s completely my fault,” he said at another. “I put myself in a bad place to be ready for showing up for a ballgame, and that is my responsibility. I take full blame for that.”
In addressing what had occurred Saturday, Harvey acknowledged that he had been out late Friday in Manhattan — “past curfew,” as he put it — and said he then played golf on Saturday morning.
The combination of those two activities, he implied, prevented him from showing up at Citi Field on Saturday afternoon as the Mets prepared to play a night game against the Miami Marlins.
While he belatedly contacted the Mets that afternoon, he did not follow the team’s protocol in doing so, and the Mets ended up sending team employees to his apartment to check on him.
Over the weekend, a person close to Harvey who said he was not authorized to speak publicly said that Harvey had a migraine on Saturday afternoon and that that was why he did not go to the ballpark.
However, at his news conference, which included opening remarks and then a half-dozen questions from reporters, Harvey did not mention having a headache. He stuck to putting himself at fault and said he felt “terrible” thinking about how his actions had affected the team.
They were contrite words from a pitcher who in 2013 was one of the best in baseball but has since endured two operations, assorted struggles on the mound and the increasing perception that he is too wedded to a celebrity lifestyle and does not take his job seriously enough. Harvey has struggled this season, and his ERA is an unsightly 5.14.
“I told him he needs to make baseball No. 1,” manager Terry Collins said. “When he did that, he was on top of the world.”
Among the teammates who addressed Harvey’s apology before Tuesday’s game were Jay Bruce and Curtis Granderson, who both said they accepted him at his word. “It was genuine and heartfelt, and he definitely thought it out,” Granderson said.
Bruce added: “The sentiment in the room is that this is a professional atmosphere and there are rules. And if the rules are broken, there are going to be consequences paid. There are no grudges or lasting effects. We have to move on.”
At his news conference, Harvey said he understood the Mets’ reasoning behind the suspension and said a grievance of the Mets’ action, which would proceed through the players’ union, was “the last thing” on his mind.
He also said he wanted to send his apologies to any Mets fans who went to Citi Field on Sunday hoping to see him pitch and instead discovered that he had been suspended. In his absence, the Mets used Adam Wilk, a minor league call-up who was quickly hammered by the Marlins in a disheartening 7-0 defeat.
“I’m doing everything in my power so that never happens again,” Harvey said. “I’m looking forward to getting things back on track to help this team win and help this organization moving forward. They all have my word on that.”
Making good on that pledge may be Harvey’s biggest challenge. In October 2015, Harvey failed to show up for the Mets’ first workout of the postseason. In that instance, he was also out with friends the night before. At the time, he said it would not happen again — and now it has.
Asked about that episode at the news conference, Harvey said people make mistakes.
“I’ve made another mistake,” he said. “There are things that I’ve realized in the last couple days that I need to be doing and should not be doing.”
He added that he should put himself “in a better place to perform physically and be accountable for my work.”
Collins said he considered the suspension a wake-up call for Harvey, who is eligible for free agency after the 2018 season. Asked if the Mets considered Harvey’s lifestyle to be a problem, Collins said Harvey had discussed that matter with “professionals.”
Granderson said: “It’s not like he’s facing any criminal charges for what he did. It’s a mistake. Everyone in this locker room, including the coaching staff and including the front office and the fans at home that are watching, have made some mistake at some point in time.”
Nevertheless, a lot of those fans may have grown weary of Harvey’s failures on and off the field. To win them back, he will probably have to do more than apologize — he will need to carry out his promise to both carry himself and pitch better than he has this season, and help restore some stability to the Mets’ injury-riddled starting rotation.
His first chance will come on Friday night in Milwaukee. “We’ve got to get him back out there,” Collins said.
