Clint Hurdle says it frequently: Pinch-hitting is not easy. Without four or five plate appearances to hone timing and see a starter’s arsenal, pinch-hitters have to tune up off a machine, then come in cold, probably against a reliever throwing mid-90s. 

Or in Matt Joyce’s case, a side-arming lefty.

“He’s unbelievable,” Gregory Polanco said. “That’s not easy coming from the bench.”

Joyce pinch-hit for Jeff Locke in the seventh inning Saturday, so Mike Scioscioa summoned lefty Greg Mahle. 

“He changes arm angles,” Joyce said. “You’re just trying to stay with him and see if he’s going to drop down or not at first. After that, he kept dropping down and kept coming from the same release point. Felt like I saw it pretty well. I’m looking for something up and out over the plate. Fouled off the first pitch. Felt like I saw the sliders pretty well, and he made a mistake with two strikes. Obviously I capitalized on it.”

The three-run, pinch-hit homer was Joyce’s sixth of the season. He’s hitting .348 as a pinch-hitter.

“It’s as good a streak as I’ve been around outside of Rusty Staub’s back when I played with him,” Hurdle said. “You drop a pinch-hitter’s name, you drop it in the context of Rusty Staub, you’re talking about a special guy.”

I don’t know exactly which streak Hurdle is talking about, but Staub hit .296/.372/.481 in 94 pinch-hit plate appearances with the Mets in 1983, when Hurdle also played for the Mets.

“They announce [Joyce], Scioscia goes to the lefty, then the guy comes in, he’s throwing sidearm, and you’re thinking, this is the kind of guy they bring in to get a lefty out,” Locke said. “He just strokes the ball so well.”

**********

Locke allowed three runs and seven hits in seven innings. He did not walk a batter for the second start in a row and is averaging fewer than 12 pitches per inning in his past two starts.

“It’s been good,” Locke said. “We’re throwing more strikes, we’re attacking the plate a lot more efficiently. We’re still falling behind guys. It’s not like we’re perfect out there. We’re not doing things a whole lot different, but now it’s a 1-2 pitch instead of a 2-1 pitch, and it makes a lot of difference in the long run.”

Locke has been experimenting with a harder breaking ball rather than the knuckle curve that sits 80-82. He threw one, to Mike Trout, and it almost went behind him. It’s a work in progress, but having both fingers on the ball rather than one allows Locke to stay on top of the pitch and release it out front, in his words, rather than try to snap off a nasty curve by releasing it around his ear.

**********

Gregory Polanco wasn’t disappointed that a Highmark sign knocked down his long homer and prevented it from possibly reaching the river.

“I’m alright,” he said with a smile. “Just over the wall, the yellow line, I’m alright.”

Asked about the first-pitch changeup he saw from Fernando Salas that became his ninth homer, he got some help from his locker neighbor.

“That’s El Coffee,” Josh Harrison said. ”He’s hot.”

First Published: June 5, 2016, 12:54 a.m.