PORT ST. LUCIE — Mike Pelfrey has thrown two kinds of pitches this spring: sinkers and stinkers.
The Cardinals jumped on the latter yesterday, hitting three home runs against the right-hander, adding to Pelfrey’s miserable spring in the Mets’ 10-5 exhibition loss at Digital Domain Park.
Pelfrey has now allowed a whopping seven homers in his last two starts — albeit with the wind as his enemy.
But even in a hurricane, seven homers allowed over 10 1/3 innings might grab your attention.
“I’ll be happy to get out of Florida, that’s for sure,” Pelfrey said after allowing six earned runs over 5 2/3 innings. He fell to 0-2 with a 7.97 ERA this spring.
Most of the damage has been inflicted on Pelfrey’s four-seam fastball. Pelfrey said that was the case yesterday on home runs surrendered to Colby Rasmus, Ryan Ludwick and Albert Pujols.
Rasmus’ ball was carried by a 21-mph wind over the left-field fence, but Ludwick and Pujols crushed shots. Six days earlier, the Nationals got two wind-blown homers against Pelfrey in Viera, Fla., but two other balls were legitimate homers.
Whatever the case, Pelfrey isn’t fooling too many people.
“He’s got to get the ball down,” manager Jerry Manuel said. “He’s probably got to pitch a little more in at times. When he got the ball up, they hit it up and it went out of the park.”
Pelfrey’s day began unraveling in the third, after missing on a close two-strike pitch to Rasmus, who then homered to put the Cardinals up 2-0. The next batter, Ludwick also homered. Allen Craig’s triple the next inning led to another run and Pujols homered in the fifth. Kyle Lohse completed the scoring against Pelfrey with an RBI in the sixth.
Pelfrey is expected to make a final Grapefruit League start on either Friday or Saturday before it starts counting.
The Mets might not be concerned if Pelfrey was coming off a strong season, but he went 10-12 with a 5.03 ERA last year.
“It’s going to be fine,” Pelfrey said. “It’s just the results haven’t been the greatest, but the best spring training I ever I had [in 2007], I started off the season 0-7 and got sent down. I don’t put a whole lot of stock in spring training.”
Pitching coach Dan Warthen said Pelfrey hit 95 mph on the radar gun and was effective when keeping his pitches down. Manuel would expect to see Pelfrey feed off that once the bell rings to start the season.
“As long as the arm strength is there, [Pelfrey] threw some pretty good sliders, some pretty good splits and there were times he threw some pretty good sinkers,” Manuel said.
Pelfrey isn’t the only Mets starter who has struggled this spring. John Maine, Oliver Perez and Jon Niese have scuffled and even Johan Santana hasn’t been sharp. Niese, with a 5.59 ERA, has the best numbers among the projected starting five.
If Pelfrey is concerned, he isn’t letting it show.
“We got to [104] pitches today and the secondary stuff is the best it’s ever been, it’s good,” Pelfrey said. “When it comes around April 7, 8 and 9, [the starters are] going to be ready and go out there and give the team a chance to win.”