El Duque Has Got To Take It A Little Easy

Tonight, The Duke makes his return to the Mets as he takes on the Marlins.

I know El Duque is no Spring Chicken, but he has to take it a little easy on his pre game warm ups and post game cool downs. The Mets and Mets fans are relying, heavily, on him to perform as the number two starter (three when Pedro comes back).

Look at what happened when he went on the disabled list. The Mets brought up Chan Ho Park and Jason Vargas to fill his spot in the rotation. We all know how those two did. They were no medium twos earned run kind of pitcher, like El Duque has been so far this season.

I know that it’s inevitable that he’s going to be on the DL again. Willie has just got to find a way to keep him rested, while keeping him on some sort of schedule.

Maybe if the Mets were to turn to a six man rotation once Pedro comes back. But that seems to be my only solution.

Any way you look at the situation, Orlando “El Duque” Hernandez has got to keep better track of how hard he pushes himself off the field. That should at least keep his injuries down to on the field situations.