Michael Conforto
There’s shooting yourself in the foot, and then there is doing what the Mets did against the Rockies today.
Somehow, the Mets grounded into five . . . FIVE! . . . double plays.
Each one of them were brutal.
In the second, after the Rockies turned a 1-0 Mets lead (Todd Frazier first inning solo home run) into a 3-1 Rockies lead, Jose Bautista earned a leadoff walk against Rockies starter Kyle Freeland.
Bautista would be erased when Kevin Plawecki grounded into a 6-4-3 double play.
In the third, after Brandon Nimmo hit an RBI single to pull the Mets within 5-2, Frazier would hit into the inning ending 5-4-3 double play.
In the sixth, Michael Conforto led off the inning with a single. He would be immediately erased when Wilmer Flores hit into a 5-4-3 double play.
In the seventh, Jose Reyes, who for some inexplicable reason started a second straight game, was erased on an Amed Rosario 6-4-3 double play.
Speaking of Reyes, he can’t field and doesn’t know how to use sunglasses:
How is Reyes to know to put his sunglasses on? He's only been alive for 35 years. pic.twitter.com/5GbS3AvmIs
— Meditations in Panic City (@MedInPanicCity) June 21, 2018
Finally in the eighth, after the Mets pulled themselves to within 6-3 on a Flores sacrifice fly, Devin Mesoraco hit into the inning ending 5-4-3 double play.
You combine all of these double plays with Steven Matz allowing five runs on eight hits and two walks in 5.2 innings, and you have all the makings of a 6-4 loss.
Game Notes: After another poor outing in this game, Paul Sewald was demoted to Triple-A. He is joined by Chris Flexen. In their stead Drew Smith and Kevin Kaczmarski will be called up.
Much of the game was deja vu back to the previous game.
While Seth Lugo isn’t Jason Vargas, he really struggled in the thin air. Lugo just couldn’t figure out how to throw his curve, and as a result, he allowed six runs on six hits in three innings.
That really put the Mets behind the right ball despite their breaking out for three runs in the first.
Still, despite falling behind 6-4, the Mets would take the lead with a four run fifth.
The rally started with a Dominic Smith triple. After a Wilmer Flores sacrifice fly, the Mets would load the bases, and a run would be forced home on a Brandon Nimmo walk.
Asdrubal Cabrera hit a two RBI single to give the Mets a 8-6 lead.
The bases would reload with Michael Conforto drawing a walk. The Rockies then brought in Bryan Shaw, who got Todd Frazier to ground out to end the inning.
With the lead, Mickey Callaway brought in Robert Gsellman to not just hold the lead but to get multiple innings from him. He got neither.
In the bottom of the fifth, right after the Mets retook the lead, the Rockies took it back with Ryan McMahon hitting a three run homer to give the Rockies a 9-8 lead.
At this point in time, it appeared like this was going to be a classic back-and-forth Coors Field game. It certainly felt that way in the sixth as the Mets loaded the bases with one out and Rockies reliever Harrison Musgrave having lost the strike zone.
In a surprise decision, Callaway tabbed Kevin Plawecki to pinch hit instead of Amed Rosario. Perhaps it was the reliever having lost the strike zone and Callaway wanting a hitter who has a better read of the strike zone.
In any event, the choice was Plawecki, who worked a full count, swung at a borderline pitch which was probably ball four, and he hit into the inning ending double play.
That was it from the Mets. After that, there were no more rallies. With the Rockies scoring a run off Anthony Swarzak in the bottom of the sixth, the final score would be 10-8.
Suddenly, a Mets team who appeared poised to make a little run is now just hoping to earn a split.
Game Notes: Chris Flexen, who is on three days rest, was called up to give the Mets an extra arm in the bullpen. To make room for Flexen, Hansel Robles was sent down to Triple-A.
The hapless Mets offense had gone searching for a place to have an offensive breakout. Their tour took them to hitter’s parks like Cincinnati, Philadelphia, Atlanta, and Arizona. All hitter’s parks, but form them to be hitter’s parks, you need to have hitters. The Mets haven’t, at least not until recently.
Finally, the Mets made it to the hitter’s paradise that is Coors Field. After two good performances to close out their series against the Diamondbacks, this Mets team was primed for an offensive explosion. That would begin with Brandon Nimmo leading off the game:
Over-the-fence home runs are becoming a little too easy and conventional for Brandon Nimmo. pic.twitter.com/52B07uHPWa
— New York Mets (@Mets) June 19, 2018
It was Nimmo who hit the go-ahead homer in Sunday’s big comeback against the Diamondbacks, and it was him homering again to lead-off the game.
With that Nimmo homer, Jacob deGrom was in a rare position. He had a lead with himself on the mound. If you had any concern about how deGrom would handle these uncharted waters in a ballpark like Coors Field, you shouldn’t. One again, deGrom was great.
Through eight innings, deGrom limited the Rockies to two runs (one earned) on five hits while walking one and striking out seven. This made deGrom the rare pitcher who came to Coors Field and actually lowered his ERA. It now stands at an MLB best 1.51.
Though it’s criminal it took this long, deGrom finally got his fifth win of the season. That happened because the Mets offense finally exploded.
In the second, Michael Conforto started a rally with a double, and he would come home to score on a Jose Bautista RBI groundout.
One important thing to note about this game is the Mets organization has long shied away from having either Nimmo or Conforto face Major League left-handed pitching. In a game started by the left-handed Tyler Anderson, both Nimmo and Conforto had great games:
- Nimmo: 4-6, 2 R, 2 HR, 4 RBI
- Conforto: 3-4, 2 R, 2B, BB, SB
In addition to the Nimmo and Conforto exploits, Wilmer Flores would contribute with a third inning solo shot, and Devin Mesoraco would hit a two run homer in the eighth.
At that point, the Mets lead 6-2, and the game was pretty much on hand. That said, with this being Coors Field, it didn’t hurt the Mets added on some insurance runs.
In a six run ninth inning, the Mets batted around, and the Mets would score runs on:
- Mesoraco bases loaded walk
- Bautista bases loaded walk
- Amed Rosario two run double
- Nimmo two RBI single
After that, it was 12-2. After a scoreless ninth from Paul Sewald, the Mets have finally have won three games in a row. That is in no small part due to their bats waking up scoring 22 runs over three games. To put that in perspective, the Mets offense only scored 21 runs over the 13 games prior to Saturday’s victory over the Diamondbacks.
Game Notes: Bautista replaced Jay Bruce from the starting lineup after he was once again scratched due to injury.
Well, with two outs in the ninth, this once again appeared to be a typical Mets loss.
After Todd Frazier‘s first inning sacrifice fly, the Mets couldn’t muster more than a run.
The offense couldn’t muster more than a run.
While Zack Wheeler pitched well allowing just two earned on three hits in six innings, for the fourth time in five starts, he couldn’t hold onto a narrow margin.
Jay Bruce came up to the plate as the go-ahead run on two different occasions,and he failed to deliver.
In his first game off the disabled list, Jeurys Familia performed like most of the bullpen allowing the Diamondbacks to score an eighth inning insurance run to give them a seemingly insurmountable 3-1 lead.
After two quick outs in the ninth, the Diamondbacks choked this one away.
First, instead of allowing the Jose Reyes bunt to go foul, Alex Avila played it even though he has no shot to get him at first.
Jose Bautista hit a fly ball to right, and Jon Jay misplayed it into an RBI double.
This set the stage for Brandon Nimmo to hit the go-ahead two run homer.
While Brad Boxberger and the Diamondbacks were still dazed from the events leading to them blowing a two run lead with two outs in the ninth against an inept Mets offense, Asdrubal Cabrera would go back-to-back increasing the now Mets lead to 5-3.
This was enough room for Robert Gsellman to record his third save of the season.
With that, the Mets have won consecutive games for the first time in a month. Coincidentally, that time was also against the Diamondbacks.
This team looks better the last few days, and it will be interesting to see where the Mets go from here.
Game Notes: With his drawing two walks, Michael Conforto has reached safely in four of his last five games.
Last night, despite the Mets being mired in what was become an absurd slump, the entire Mets team was on the top railing. They were almost willing something to happen.
In the postgame, Mickey Callawaytalked about how much closer the Mets team was. It was a sentiment met with derision or eye rolling.
With the Diamondbacks starting the left-handed Patrick Corbin and with the Mets ineptitude against left-handed pitching, it seemed like the Mets offense was going to have to wait another day to finally break out.
Well, baseball is a funny game because this was the day the Mets offense broke out.
Actually, it wasn’t really the Mets offense. It was really Michael Conforto:
See ya later. ? ? ?@mconforto8 gives us a 3-0 lead! pic.twitter.com/lVf0bPByI2
— New York Mets (@Mets) June 17, 2018
The homer coming off a LHP, which the Mets told us Confurto could turn hit, gave fans all the more reason for optimism.
It was more than just the three run homer from Conforto. In the sixth, he would also double home Devin Mesoraco.
That increased the Mets lead to 5-1 with the five runs scored being the most amount of runs scored by this Mets team since the McKinley administration.
The fourth run was scored on a Corbin wild pitch in the third. Just so you know the Mets are still the Mets, that wild pitch also put Todd Frazier at second with just one out. The Mets could not get him home.
The five run lead held up because Steven Matz was terrific. He kept the Diamondbacks at bat limiting them to just one run on six hits and one walk through 6.2 innings.
He would get into a bit of trouble in the seventh with Deven Marrero and Daniel Descalso hitting back-to-back one out singles. The second of which was deflected by a diving Dominic Smith, who could not make the play.
With the way things have been going, you expected this rally to blow up. It didn’t help ease your nerves when Robert Gsellman came in and hit Jon Jay to load the bases.
The Nick Ahmed grounder up the middle looked like trouble, but Asdrubal Cabrera showed more range than he has in over a fortnight. Cabrera got the ball and flipped it to Amed Rosario out raced Jay to the bag for the final out of the inning.
Believe it or not, it was smooth sailing from there with the Mets pulling out a 5-1 victory.
Game Notes: Gsellman became the first Met to use the Diamondbacks bullpen cart
With the way things are going with the New York Mets, it is becoming increasingly clear this team will be in position to sell at the trade deadline. The question is what in the world do the Mets have to sell.
Well, the biggest asset the Mets have right now is Jacob deGrom. If he was ever truly available, you would have 29 teams lining up to give you their best prospects. The problem with that is, you could assume the Mets will not deal with either the Yankees or the Nationals. With the Yankees, you are taking one deep farm system off the table, and that is assuming the Yankees would part with their top prospects in a trade with the Mets.
Overall, based on recent comments from Sandy Alderson, it does not appear the Mets are trading deGrom anytime soon, which is a relief because Sandy really does poor work at the trade deadline. He’s much better working deals in the offseason.
So when looking at players to trade, you obviously begin with guys on the last year of their deals. Well, the Mets don’t have much to offer there:
Jerry Blevins – the LOOGY has a 5.28 ERA, 1.761 WHIP, and a 6.5 BB/9. Worse than that, left-handed batters are hitting .351/.415/.514 off of him.
Jose Bautista – When he was released, the Mets were seemingly the only team who called him, and it’s hard to imagine teams giving up much for a second division bench player with a .366 SLG.
Asdrubal Cabrera – A year after the Mets found no takers for him, they may be in the same position after having him play through injuries. Since April 24th, he’s hitting .233/.269/.423 while playing the worst defensive second base in the majors (-10 DRS).
Jeurys Familia – If he returns from the DL healthy, Familia has real value because he has once again shown himself to be a good reliever and closer. The issue with him is Sandy Alderson flipped Addison Reed, who was healthier and having a better year, for an uninspiring group of Gerson Bautista, Jamie Callahan, and Stephen Nogosek.
Devin Mesoraco – Briefly, Mesoraco was a revelation showing power and helping buttress a struggling Mets lineup. The hot streak has worn off, and he’s hitting .107 with no extra base hits over his last nine games.
AJ Ramos – Ramos is contemplating season ending shoulder surgery. That would take him off the table. The same can be said for his 6.41 ERA.
Jose Reyes – He’s the worst player in all of baseball this year; one the Mets are reportedly asking to retire.
Alright, so the Mets don’t have much in terms of players on expiring deals. Maybe, the team can look at players whose deals are expiring after the 2019 season:
Todd Frazier – The normally durable Frazier landed on the DL, and he has not been the power hitter he has been in his career. The positives are he’s kept a solid walk rate while playing a solid third base. Overall, he’s the type of player who is of more value to you than to what you would get back in a deal.
Jason Vargas – He’s now a five inning pitcher with a 7.39 ERA.
Zack Wheeler – Wheeler is an interesting case because he has shown promise, but he is still prone to the occasional hiccups. He’s probably not due for a large arbitration increase from his $1.8 million, which should be enticing for a Mets team who probably doesn’t want to spend $8 million to replace him with next year’s Vargas.
So, right now, looking at the expiring deals by the end of the 2019 season, the Mets assets basically amount to Familia and maybe Frazier and Wheeler. Arguably, Frazier and Wheeler are not bringing back the type of players who would be key pieces of a rebuild. To that extent, you at least have to question why you would move them on a Mets team with a fairly solid core which includes Brandon Nimmo, Michael Conforto, Seth Lugo, Robert Gsellman, Noah Syndergaard, and deGrom.
And really, past that group, there isn’t much else available for the Mets to trade to justify blowing it up.
Jay Bruce is injured, and he already looks like he’s in a group with Jason Bay and Vince Coleman for the worst free agent mistake in Mets history. Yoenis Cespedes is both injury prone and has a no trade deal, which will likely limit their ability to move him.
Really, what the Mets need to be doing is some soul searching.
Much like they did when they extended David Wright, the team needs to assess whether players like deGrom and Syndergaard will be here when promising young players like Andres Gimenez, David Peterson, Justin Dunn, Mark Vientos, and Jarred Kelenic are here to open the Mets next World Series window.
If they’re not, you’re doing the franchise a complete disservice by hanging in this if everything breaks right structure. Really, things only broke right in 2015, and the team has been ill designed every since.
Blow it up now, or start spending money on players like Manny Machado this offseaosn. If you’re not doing that, this Mets team isn’t going anywhere for at least the next decade.
The Mets lost this game 7-3. Sadly, one of the reasons for the loss was Seth Lugofinally having a poor game.
The guy we all want in the rotation allowed five earned on eight hits in five innings pitched.
It really was an off night for a guy having a great season. Unfortunately, despite Lugo bailing out the Mets several times this year, the Mets could not bail him out.
In the second, after a Dominic Smithdouble, the Mets had runners at second and third with no outs.
Kevin Plaweckigrounded out, and then on a shallow center, the noodle armed Jarrod Dyson threw it offline, and he still got it there in plenty of time to nail Jose Bautistaat the plate.
One of the reasons Bautista was sent was Lugo was due up. Of course, Lugo would single off his counter-part Zack Godley to start a rally. He’d score on a Todd Frazierdouble.
After the double, the Mets had runners at second and third with one out. Brandon Nimmo and Asdrubal Cabrerastruck out to end that rally.
Sure, Alex Avilabailed out Godley more than a few times by stopping a few balls in the dirt with a runner on third. But really, this was in an inept Mets offense.
Things looked interesting with a Smith fourth inning homer off the foul pole to make it 3-2.
From there, Lugo allowed two earned. Newest Mets Chris Beck allowed a run in 1.2 innings of work. Anthony Swarzakallowed a run in the eighth.
In the ninth, a bewildered Mets team stood at the top railing almost willing something to happen.
There was a rally in the ninth against Jorge De La Rosa with Wilmer Floreshitting an RBI double scoring an unearned run.
At that point, the Diamondbacks went to their closer, Brad Boxberger, who got Michael Confortoto fly out to left to end the game.
In case you haven’t noticed, the Mets are really bad right now.
Game Notes: Smith made an appearance in LF
While any game where the Mets are trying to snap out of this horrendous June skid has its own level of interest, this game had some extra intrigue because the Mets were facing one of the two pitchers they traded in 2015 to obtain Addison Reed.
Well, on this night, it seemed as if the Diamondbacks got a much better return for Reed than the Jamie Callahan, Gerson Bautista, Stephen Nogosek triumvirate the Mets received from the Red Sox at last year’s trade deadline.
Things look good real early for the Mets as Brandon Nimmo hit a first inning homer off of Matt Koch. After that, Koch allowed just a fifth inning single to Dominic Smith that went nowhere before he allowed a Michael Conforto solo shot in the sixth inning.
All told, Koch pitched six innings allowing the two homers while walking one and striking out five. To be fair, with the way the Mets offense is going, we can’t tell if Koch is the one who got away or if a pitcher with a 4.20 ERA entering the game looked good because any semi-competent pitcher can shut down the Mets right now.
Now, the aforementioned Conforto homer pulled the Mets to within 3-2. They were behind because Jason Vargas wasn’t great . . . again.
After getting a lead, he surrendered it almost immediately in the second on a rally started by his first issuing a leadoff walk to John Ryan Murphy and then hitting David Peralta. Now, Peralta made no effort to get out of the way of the ball, a point Mickey Callaway seemed to be chirping about from the dugout, but there’s not point being bitter, right?
Anyway, Murphy came around and scored on an ensuing Ketel Marte single.
Vargas got out of that jam, but he allowed solo shots to Paul Goldschmidt and Peralta in consecutive innings to put the Mets down 3-1.
After his five innings, you could honestly say Vargas kept the Mets in the game. That’s a real accomplishment from where he was to start the season.
By the seventh, the Mets were down a run, and they were still in this game. After 1.2 fine innings from Hansel Robles, Callaway brought in Jerry Blevins to face a stretch of left-handed Diamondback batters starting with Daniel Descalso.
With two outs and an inherited runner from Robles, Blevins first allowed Descalso to single, and then he hit the left-handed hitting Jon Jay to load the bases.This led to Callaway bringing in Sewald, who is struggling every bit as much as Vargas and Blevins. He proceeded to walk Nick Ahmed to force home a run.
Think about that. Robles was the Mets best reliever of the night, and he is the one charged with a run after Blevins’ and Sewald’s inept performances.
Speaking of poor performances, after Amed Rosario hit a solo shot in the eighth inning to pull the Mets within 4-3, Jacob Rhame came in and allowed solo homers to Peralta and Jake Lamb. At that point, the Mets were down 6-3, and they were well past their quota for runs in a game.
Ultimately, this game amounted to the pitchers Sandy Alderson brought in to help this team completely failing, but sure, let’s all blame Callaway for this team’s performance.
Game Notes: Tim Peterson was sent down to make room for new Met Chris Beck on the roster. Beck did not make an appearance.
You know what the Mets do to win a game? Score a run.
You know what they need to score those runs? Get some hits, at least more than two.
Through the first six innings, Braves rookie Mike Soroka faced the minimum while no-hitting the Mets.
Finally, Michael Conforto broke through with a leadoff single to start the seventh. After that, it was strikeout-strikeout-Jay Bruce pop out.
While the Mets were once again setting baseball back to the days of the New York Nine, Jacob deGrom was once again pitching like the best player in baseball.
In seven innings, deGrom allowed just one run, and while that run was charged as an earned run, it wasn’t entirely on him.
After a Dansby Swanson one out double, Freddie Freeman hit a single Brandon Nimmo booted in left costing him of any opportunity to get Swanson out at the plate.
That was it. Once that run scored, the Mets chances of winning went with it. In fact, as noted by Elias, the Mets are the first team ever to score fewer than 15 runs and compile less than 50 hits over an 11 game span (h/t Good Fundies).
Because Freeman owns both the Mets and Jerry Blevins, he hit a solo shot in the eighth to expand the Braves lead to 2-0.
The Mets did have a rally in them in the ninth. Conforto drew a one out walk, and Nimmo hit a two out double. That put the game in Bruce’s hands.
With the tying runs on base, Bruce hit the first pitch Aroyds Vizcaino offered him. It was a game ending pop out to short. It was a fitting end to another miserable loss.
Game Notes: After pinch hitting for Luis Guillorme in the top of the eighth, Jose Bautista stayed in the game and played his first game at second base in a decade.