Edwin Diaz's problems may have mental health tie after injury return for New York Mets

Against the Miami Marlins on May 18, New York Mets relief pitcher Edwin Diaz surrendered four earned runs in 1/3 of an inning - almost half the number of runs he gave up the entirety of his dominant 2022 season. Afterward, he sat down at his locker, dropped his head in his hands and began to cry .

Diaz has endured a season full of low points. He's been demoted, injured and suspended in a four-month span after he missed 2023 with a torn patellar tendon. The setbacks sometimes feel heavy, and the emotions pour out.

Yet Diaz is hardly the first pitcher to falter after a major injury, and he might eventually find a way back to his All-Star best. According to sports psychologist and Los Angeles Dodgers mental health practitioner Mark Aoyagi in an exclusive interview, scores of MLB players struggle with confidence similarly to Diaz upon returning from lengthy stints on the Injured List.

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“A lot of pitchers coming back from injury will say they just have to reinvent their arsenal,” he told Mirror Sports U.S. “Whether it’s not moving the same way as it did before or whether they can’t command it the same way as they did before or whether the velocity’s changed.

“We’re talking about the minutest differences between a dominant pitcher and somebody that’s out of the league. And so, you lose one small part of that and it’s really hard to come back.”

It wasn’t long ago that Diaz held Citi Field within the palm of his hand, the bellowing trumpets of “Narco” - his signature walkout song - signaling an all-but guaranteed win for the Mets. But the once lights-out closer has struggled to regain his dominant form since tearing the patellar tendon in his right knee on March 15, 2023, in large part due to his mental struggles.

“I won’t lie, my confidence I feel is down right now,” Diaz told reporters on the heels of his four-run implosion against the Marlins earlier this season. “I’m making pitches. I’m throwing strikes. I’m trying to do my best to help the team to win. Right now I’m not in that capacity.

“Physically, I feel 100 percent right now. My body is not an issue. I think right now I’ve got to think about what I’m doing, trust myself a little bit more when I’m on the mound. I think I’m thinking too much.”

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Pressures of excellence

Two years ago, Diaz overwhelmed opponents rather than the other way around. In 61 appearances during the 2022 season, the hard-throwing right-hander boasted a 1.31 ERA and a 50.2% strikeout rate en route to being named the Trevor Hoffman National League Relief Pitcher of the Year.

The Mets promptly awarded Diaz with a five-year, $102 million contract the following offseason, marking the richest deal in baseball history for a relief pitcher. But with the historic performance and lucrative contract came greater expectations and added pressure.

“On the one hand … you feel great, you feel on top of the world,” Aoyagi said. “You just did the thing that you love to do at the highest level.

“But then a lot of times, there's this nagging [question of] can you do it again? Are you going to live up to the hype? Are you going to let your family down or let your endorsers down or let your agent down?”

As these worries likely swirled in the back of Diaz’s mind, the All-Star reliever sustained a freak injury that’d sink him into an even darker headspace. While celebrating with Puerto Rican teammates after closing out a win over the Dominican Republic in the World Baseball Classic, he collapsed to the ground and promptly grabbed at his right knee.

As medical staff carted Diaz off the field in a wheelchair, several Puerto Rico players broke down in tears, knowing the difficult road to recovery that awaited their compatriot.

“There's no doubt that you feel isolated, you feel alone,” Aoyagi explained. “So much of their identity and their self esteem is wrapped up in being able to perform as major league baseball players. And so when they can't do that, they start to question everything.”

Long road back

Doctors diagnosed Diaz with a full-thickness tear of the patellar tendon in his right knee, an injury that usually requires six months to a year to fully recuperate from. Though he flirted with the idea of returning in September of 2023, Mets top brass decided against it, considering New York wasn’t in the playoff race.

Since returning this season, Diaz has shown flashes of brilliance, but has struggled to firmly regain his footing on the mound - at one point even losing his closer role following an especially poor stretch of play.

Per Baseball Savant , Diaz’s fastball is currently averaging 97.2 mph, a noticeable dip from the 99.1 mph he averaged in 2022. His slider, meanwhile, has a 66.4% contact rate - nearly 20 percentage points higher than 2022.

Then there’s the time he’s missed. In May, the Mets placed Diaz - who boasts a 4.05 ERA entering the All-Star break - on the 15-day IL with a right shoulder impingement. One month later, the 30-year-old was suspended for 10 games by MLB after violating the league’s sticky substance regulations.

Few pitchers understand Diaz’s current plight better than Los Angeles Dodgers reliever Daniel Hudson, who suffered a torn ACL and sprained MCL in back-to-back seasons the last two years. “I'm sure he's going through some interesting stuff with his knees, he probably still feels not like himself,” Hudson exclusively told Mirror Sports U.S. last month.

"When you go that long without pitching … it takes a while to get your legs back under you, get your mechanics to where they were the previous time."

Mets outfielder Brandon Nimmo attributed Diaz’s struggles to the extended period of time he missed - but remained confident that the dominant pitcher would rediscover himself.

“I think you take for granted how playing every day and being in it every day really can help your routine and help you be ready to compete,” Nimmo exclusively told Mirror Sports U.S. “So when you take a year off from it, there's definitely a chance for some rust or a lull to happen.”

“But I have confidence that him getting back into it, he'll get that confidence back and execute the pitches and be able to get back to his old form.”