PORT ST. LUCIE — Jiminy Cricket made an appearance on Field 2 at the Mets spring training complex on Saturday.
That was the voice in Matt Harvey’s head, reminding him to avoid the temptation to push too hard in his first throwing session since undergoing Tommy John surgery in October.
“There was a little guy in the back of my head saying, ‘Don’t go too strong,’ ” Harvey said after making 20 throws from 60 feet. “He’s usually the one that is right. I’m feeling good, and as competitive as I am, I always want to push more, but that Jiminy Cricket in the back of my head was telling me no.”
The throwing session came on the four-month anniversary of Harvey’s surgery. Harvey, whom the Mets expect to miss the entire 2014 season, plans to throw three times weekly in this first phase of his comeback.
Eventually, Harvey will graduate to long tossing and throwing from a bullpen mound before getting into minor league rehab games.
“Shoulder strength is kind of the last thing that comes with the whole process,” Harvey said. “And I haven’t picked up a baseball in five months, so obviously the throwing process of building all that strength back, the only way to do that is by throwing, and that is what takes so long.”
Harvey will have company in his rehab — Jeremy Hefner, who underwent Tommy John surgery in August, also just began throwing. In Harvey’s case, Dr. James Andrews took a tendon from the pitcher’s right wrist and used it to bolster the torn ulnar collateral ligament in his elbow. Harvey was told Andrews got three “wraps” with the tendon on top of the normal ligament, giving the right-hander the equivalent of four ligaments.
Though Harvey hopes for a late-season return, he said he isn’t going to set a goal at this point.
“The last thing I want to do is say August or September and have myself work too hard,” Harvey said. “I have to stay with the doctor’s program, stay with the process and if somehow I’m good to go in August, all power to me. As of now I have to keep things slow and if they keep progressing, then you never know.”
General manager Sandy Alderson indicated the Mets will make sure Harvey doesn’t attempt to accelerate the process.
“He will be monitored closely,” Alderson said. “So doctors will be checking on him, our rehab specialist down here will be checking on him. We’ll have quite a number of people that will monitor his progress. I don’t think he will get too far ahead of himself.”
Harvey has expressed a preference for rehabbing with the team in New York once spring training concludes, but Alderson would like the right-hander to remain in Florida. According to the collective bargaining agreement, Harvey has final say on the issue, after the first 20 days of rehab in which the Mets can dictate his locale.
“We’ll get to the end of spring training, see where he is and I’m sure there will be some discussion between now and then,” Alderson said. “The CBA poses limitations, but in the past for the most part our players have been here and it’s been a good situation. And absent unusual circumstances, it will probably be a good situation for him, too.”
Manager Terry Collins didn’t watch Harvey’s throwing session on Saturday because he said he is trying to focus on the team he will be bringing north for Opening Day.
“I’m not going to BS anybody, it’s hard,” Collins said. “It’s going to be tough for me not to watch.”