He wants to tempt fate in a year when fate is slashing 1.000/1.000/4.000 against the Mets.

Noah Syndergaard, known to his close friends and hopefully not by Marvel lawyers as “Thor”, partially tore his lat on April 30. The tall drink of doom has been itching to return to a major league mound before the end of the 2017 season ever since. The problem is that this is an insanely terrible idea. After a recent two inning rehab start, the Norse God felt “pretty tired”, and he bailed on a simulated game soon after due to “general soreness”.

The good news for Syndergaard is that the Mets continue to let the players dictate what to do, and have opted to keep the Terrible Idea Factory humming for a few more weeks. The sadistic part of me insists that Wilmer Flores breaking his own nose, off of his own foul ball, cannot possibly be the last headshaking #thatssomets moment of the season — it was almost three whole weeks ago after all. Maybe the 6'6" pitcher should get his deepest desires fulfilled and return to major league action, only to get attacked by a rogue pelican, or break his back sneezing while bowing to Nori Aoki, or hurt himself again after throwing a baseball one hundred miles per hour before his body was really ready to withstand such a thing. It would just be so perfect, the final shard of a black diamond which reads “Best wishes on 2017 — Your pal Chase Utley”.

Thor must be stopped for his own good. Here are our options:

Put Him in a Room With Matt Harvey For Five Minutes

“You know how I said 2014 sucked because I missed the whole season recovering from Tommy John surgery?” Harvey would begin. “Well it wasn’t all bad. There’s stuff to do in New York.” Once Syndergaard got Harvey back on track, he would show him footage from his last few starts. “Did you really think the muscles behind my throwing shoulder magically stopped being half the size of the ones behind my left?” Matt would ask, wiping his tears with a Batman mask long ago repurposed as a handkerchief. (This is admittedly an incredibly depressing option.)

Call the Lunch Police

As you read this, the unemployed loose cannon formerly known as Meal Lieutenant Bobby Parnell is stroking his unkempt beard, sitting on his cold wooden floor, alternating between choking down Evan Williams and giggling to himself. Be a shame if someone sent him Instagram photos of Noah enjoying a meal on the same day as a ballgame.

Say the Season is Over and Hope He Buys It

“Dude, we just played our last game.”

“That’s an old schedule. I don’t know what to tell you.”

“You can’t trust the media minions these days, you know that.”

Trick Him Into Saying Something Stupid so He Gets Suspended

Godwin’s Law states that the longer an internet discussion takes place, the more likely someone will be compared to Hitler. Thor’s Law states that if pretty much anyone posts anything on the internet, eventually Noah Syndergaard will call them a douche. Officially the Mets reported Syndergaard “played catch” on back-to-back days in Chicago. All one has to do is insist online that he “had a catch” for Thor’s internal troll alarms to go off.

Have Mr. Met Travel With the Team

Due to some “unpleasantness”, Mr. Met needs to reclaim his role as the family-friendly ambassador of the ballclub. And everybody needs a Mets shirt.

Screen: SNY/MLB

Every

Single

Slab of Meat and Bones

Make Him Think It’ll Lead to Global Warming

Have you met Wokergaard?

“100mph heaters can’t possibly be good for the environment Noah.” An admittedly likely result of this is Syndergaard throwing nothing but curveballs the rest of his career, with the occasional flirtation of a knuckleball. The sight of the latter might be worth the risk. Laughter is welcome after all.