BaseballAmerica.com: Majors: Going Deep: Philip Humber And Mike Pelfrey

First there was Wright and Reyes. Then came Carlos and Carlos. Now there's . . . Humfrey? The National League powerhouse Mets were built in pairs, so it's no surprise that along this year come two top pitching prospects, Mike Pelfrey and Philip Humber, on the brink of injecting the team's aging rotation with youthful verve and serious talent. I sat down with Pelfrey and Humber in St. Lucie, Fla., to discuss their imminent impact, budding friendship and eagerness to hit the big time.

ALAN SCHWARZ: From what I understand, you guys are so linked already. You're just this single entity that people are calling you "Humfrey."

PHILIP HUMBER: Radio people in Arizona had us on at the same time, and they thought it was kind of funny. They were asking us both the same questions and every answer we gave was verbatim what the other guy said. They made jokes like we were a two-headed monster or something.

MIKE PELFREY: We're good friends. We're both kind of in the same situation: both first-rounders, and both kind of breaking into the big leagues and trying to stay. We went to the (Arizona) Fall League together, we roomed together, we sat there and watched the playoffs together in Arizona. We kind of made a pact that the next time the Mets are in there, we're with them.

HUMBER: We're both kind of relaxed, but we really don't talk that much about pitching off the field—or baseball at all, in general. We like to have a good time. We have fun while we're at the field and then when it's time to relax we know how.

SCHWARZ: Like making fun of Philip's southern accent, right?

PELFREY: You heard about that, huh? We were in Arizona, and we were going to go work out at the gym, and we didn't know how to get there. So he calls the lady up and goes, "Hello ma'am? We're not from around here—we tryin' to find yo geey-um." I just started making fun of him, giving him a hard time.

HUMBER: The root of the whole gym thing was he didn't know his way around in Arizona. Somebody's got to call and get directions. Leave it to the kid from Texas to call the lady up, but we got there.

SCHWARZ: Getting to your pitching, Mike, you've junked the curveball in favor of a slider. Is it weird to learn a new pitch right before you're pretty much counted on to help stabilize a major league staff?

PELFREY: My fastball's my bread and butter. That's my best pitch, so I'm definitely going to use that and make the other pitches that much better. I knew my curveball wasn't very good, so I was open to suggestions. I think in the long run the slider will be a much better pitch for me.

SCHWARZ: What role did making your four starts in the majors last summer—when you went 2-1, 5.48—have for you?

PELFREY: I think the biggest thing is being comfortable now. I was kind of nitpicking around the zone. I didn't have the greatest results, but I feel like I can pitch at that level. I just need to continue to work on the secondary stuff.

SCHWARZ: When the Mets' rotation completely fell apart in the playoffs, you were in Arizona recovering from a pulled lat muscle. Was it killing you to watch, for example, Steve Trachsel pitch horribly, when you might have been able to help?

PELFREY: I wanted to be there. I think anybody's competitive nature will tell you that, hey, they want to be there, and they want to be pitching.

HUMBER: We were both sitting there wishing we were there. But it wasn't like, "Why is that guy there and we're not?" It makes you hungry. Next year that's going to be us out there pitching those important games.

SCHWARZ: Phil, you're fully healthy after Tommy John surgery. Didn't your rehab include throwing the ball underhanded, like a softball?

HUMBER: You have to relearn how that ligament is going to function, how that motion goes. It was hard the first few times, but it gave me that feel of the ball coming off your fingertips and feeling how to make the ball go faster. I think that helped me a lot when I started throwing over my head. To be honest with you, I was playing catch and it was pretty ugly, like a guy that never played before. You have no idea where the ball's going to go. I'm an impatient person by nature, and I want everything to happen right now.

SCHWARZ: Can you handle a full season's workload?

HUMBER: I feel I'm ready for that. I've learned a lot about how to take care of my body. I feel like I can handle the workload physically and mentally no matter where they put me.

SCHWARZ: You guys are both going for that fifth spot. How does it feel to be competing against each other?

HUMBER: Willie (Randolph) hasn't come to us and said, "Whoever has a better spring will make the team." It's not like, "Mike threw seven shutout innings, so I better go out there and top him." Wherever they put us, that's not going to change our mindset to find a way to help the team get to the World Series—whether that starts in April or I get called up later in the year. Last year, when we were up there, when they clinched the division, they're celebrating in the locker room and we're just kind of standing to the side taking it all in. Cliff Floyd came over to us and was like, "This is going to be you guys in years to come." That stuck with me.

PELFREY: I agree with him. You hear stuff, but you don't ever listen to it. You're still just trying to go out and you're just trying to get better, and so when the future comes, you're ready, and you're ready to stay.

SCHWARZ: Very political answers, guys. But you know you're good, and that the Mets are looking for you to bridge the Glavine-and-Pedro past to the future. What do you have to do to make it a no-brainer for the team to put you in the major league rotation, and soon?

PELFREY: I think you have to gain experience. You're proven and everybody knows what they're going to get from you, and you're consistent.

HUMBER: The only time it's going to be a no-brainer is when you have three or four good years in the big leagues, and you go from being a prospect to a bona fide major leaguer. Right now, we're unknowns, really. Mike got a lot more time than I did up there, but still he got four games—that's not a whole lot of sample size to go from.

SCHWARZ: You only got two innings in September, Phil. Do those two innings really matter?

HUMBER: It matters to me. There's no guarantees this year I'm going to get there again, so it was really cool to get into some games and see what it's like to be on that mound and know that I can compete. I threw the ball really well in both my innings, and you kind of just shake some of that unknown. I know what to expect going out there.

SCHWARZ: That's exactly what Justin Verlander said last spring when he was competing for the No. 5 spot in Detroit. And he was drafted one spot ahead of you in 2004.

HUMBER: And he had a great year. I'd be pretty happy to have a year like that this year.

SCHWARZ: Still, no friendly competition between you and Mike? You can't be that good friends.

HUMBER: The thing that I have on Mike is I have a College World Series ring. Right now I think we're pretty equal, but he'll never be able to go back and change that.

You can reach Alan Schwarz by sending e-mail to alanschwarz@baseballamerica.com.