Mets ace Taijuan Walker will not make his scheduled start on Sunday, manager Buck Showalter tells Tim Healey of Newsday. The righty has been dealing with a bulging disc in his back, which could push him back to Tuesday. Although it’s good that the injury isn’t significant enough to send him to the injured list, it still creates a short-term problem for the Mets.
Since they also sent Carlos Carrasco to the IL recently and are playing a doubleheader Saturday, they will have to come up with some sort of solution to trudge through to their next off-day, which is on Wednesday. Max Scherzer can go on Monday. Jacob deGrom could start Tuesday but could also get some extra rest if Walker is ready to go. Chris Bassitt pitched Friday night and isn’t an option for a few days. David Peterson and Trevor Williams are scheduled to start Saturday’s games, but Williams isn’t fully stretch out and was able to throw only four innings in the first game.
Jose Butto is the only starter on the 40-man roster who could be recalled, which seems to be in the cards since Healey relays that Butto is on the taxi squad. It would be a big jump for Butto if he is thrown into Sunday's game, since he’s been in Double-A all season and only got promoted to Triple-A on August 8. He has a 4.12 ERA on the year between the two levels.
Other injury tidbits from around the league…
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