Whatever plagued the Mets in Anaheim skipped the trip to St. Louis but seemed to follow them to Colorado.
An inability to cash in on scoring opportunities proved to be costly as they dropped a 6-3 decision to the Colorado Rockies at Coors Field last night in the first of their three-game series.
The Mets were 2 for 7 with runners in scoring position and 4 for 16 with men on base as they dropped to 2-3 on this current 10-game road trip. The Braves lost their third in a row, so the Mets remained 1.5 games behind Atlanta for the third NL WC spot.
Rockies starter Kyle Freeland left the game in the fifth due to a blister on his pitching hand but the Mets couldn’t get anything done againt four relievers who combined for 4 and a 1/3 scoreless innings.
Luis Severino had his velocity back but got the loss as he gave up five runs, four earned on eight hits with five strikeouts. “It was a weird game. It was like I was making pitches and every ball they hit, it was like finding ways to go to the outfield,” said Severino.
Severino’s velocity was down in his previous outing, but the good news was he had it back as he topped out at 99 MPH and was consistently hitting 98 and 97 MPH during his outing. “We saw it from the first pitch of the game,” Mets Manager Carlos Mendoza said. “He came out of the gate, 98 [MPH], 97 and that was a good sign.”
Mets took the early lead in the second.
Pete Alonso walked to lead off the inning. With one out, Jose Iglesias singled to put runners at first and second. Luis Torrens grounded to third and was thrown out on a brilliant play by Rockies’ third baseman Ryan McMahon who was in foul territory when he released the ball, but the runners moved up to second and third.
Harrison Bader came through in the clutch when he muscled a two out single to left that just got past shortstop Ezekial Tovar’s glove to plate two runs to give the Mets a 2-0 lead.
Colorado got one back in the second on a weird play that featured two errors, leading to an unearned run.
After Brendan Rodgers was hit by a pitch, Kris Bryant lined a single to right center field as Rodgers took third. Bader’s throw back to the infield eluded Francisco Lindor and was not backed up. That allowed Rogers to score as Bryant took second. The play was still alive when Mark Vientos tried to corral the ball near the third base dugout but it popped out of his glove for an error that allowed Bryant to take third.
Iglesias alert play kept the Rockies from scoring anymore in the inning. The Mets second baseman back handed Micheal Toglia’s bullet one hopper and alertly threw home to nab the slow footed Bryant at the plate.
Colorado scored three times in the fourth to take a 4-2 lead.
Rodgers led off with a single. With one out, Severino struck out Toglia but he had to work through a ten pitch at bat to to do it. Elias Diaz then lined a two out double to the right field corner that just eluded Tyrone Taylor’s glove to tie the game at two. Jake Cave then hit a 1-2 pitch from Severino into the left field stands for a two run homer and a two run lead.
Brandon Nimmo’s RBI double scored Taylor to make it a 4-3 game. It began raining as J.D. Martinez batted but he grounded out to third as Ryan McMahon made a nice defensive play to snuff out the rally.
The Rockies added a run in the fifth on an RBI double by Rodgers and one more in the eighth on Elias Diaz’ RBI single off of Alex Young, who gave up first run as a Met.
The Mets had two runners on in the sixth and the seventh but failed to score both times.
In the sixth, there were runners on first and third with one out, but pinch-hitter Jesse Winker swung at the first pitch from Rockies reliever Angel Chivelli and bounced into an inning ending 4-6-3 double play.
In the seventh, Lindor singled with two out and Nimmo lined a ball up the gap in left center field. Rockies left fielder Cave made a nice play to cut the ball off before it went to the wall so Lindor had to hold at third, but Martinez grounded out to end the inning.
“We just didn’t hit many balls hard,” Mendoza said. “We got a couple of two out hits, the Bader soft single, obviously Nimmo but after that we had second and third with two outs, first and third one out, but you could make a case we didn’t make any hard contact today.”
The Mets are having a tough time with some of the lesser teams on the slate, but they just need to survive a very difficult schedule in August and put themselves in position to make a run in September.
“At the end of the day, they’re big league players, they’re big league teams, they can beat you any day,” Mendoza said. “We gotta be ready for tomorrow. We still got an opportunity to here to win a series.”
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