May
1
2012

Mets Comeback Falls Short In 4-3 Loss To Astros

An article by Hojo's Mojo

The Mets almost grinded out another come-from-behind victory tonight in Houston, but came up a run short and fell to the Astros 4-3.

R.A. Dickey was solid and didn’t allow a hit in the first five innings before getting into some trouble in the sixth when he was roughed up for three runs, the big blow being a 2-run homer by Brian Bogusevich. Dickey didn’t figure into the decision and walked two while fanning six in six innings of work.

Manny Acosta relieved Dickey and pitched a clean seventh, but Terry Collins sent him out for the eighth and after a single, a stolen base, and another single, the Astros took a 4-3 lead and that was all she wrote.

Offensively, the Mets’ bats were quiet tonight. All their scoring came in the seventh when they scratched out three runs, two of which came off the bat of rookie Kirk Nieuwenhuis who scorched a two-run single to tie the score 3-3 at the time.

Kirk Nieuwenhuis had two hits in the games as did Ike Davis who had his second consecutive multi-hit game. It’s good to see Davis heating up at the plate. Andres Torres picked up his first hit as a Met and scored a run.

The Mets were sloppy on defense tonight with both Daniel Murphy and Josh Thole committing errors.

Acosta took the loss and is 0-2 with a 9.00 ERA this season. his days may be numbered.

Houston, the Mets bullpen has a problem…

The Mets will try to even things up tomorrow night and will have Jon Niese (2-0, 2.81 ERA) on the bump, game time is 8:05 PM.

LGM

About the Author: Rob Johnson

14 Comments + Add Comment

Russell Zanca May 1, 2012 at 12:36 am

Acosta was fine for one inning. No reason to send him out there for another, esp. after putting a guy on.
- Metsie May 1, 2012 at 12:23 pm
  
  The Issue with leaving Acosta in was the fact that Francisco wasn’t available last night.
  So Terry was trying to stretch his Bullpen with Acosta.
  
  It cost him but truth is the way our Pen has been of late no reason to believe anyone else would have done any better!
  
  The only move I could Qibble with is he should have left Byrdak in longer since he has been so good. I don’t know what his splits were against the batter and maybe that was why but he has been one of the brighter spots in the pen and was getting the outs. Shold have ridden him a bit longer or went to him a bit sooner.
sarge69 May 1, 2012 at 7:57 am

I don’t see any consistency out of this BP plus Terry leaving Acosta out there for 2 innings after his batting practice session at Coors Field says let him pitch one inning, get other team out and leave with encouraging outing but…
- trs86 May 1, 2012 at 8:31 am
  
  I agree and said so last night, this one is on Terry. If we had won it would have been on Mills. You saw the extremes of both sides last night.
  Acosta should have never came back out for the 2nd inning. I also don’t like the idea of…. well if we had had the lead I would have used Rauch. Well what now? You never got the lead and your mop up pitcher cost you the chance to win the game.
- Alex in CT May 1, 2012 at 8:36 am
  
  There’s a lot I like about Collins, but in a season and a quarter managing the bullpen is not one of them. When Acosta came out for the second inning, defeat was inevitable. I dont what he was thinking. Where the heck is Parnell?
  - trs86 May 1, 2012 at 8:39 am
    
    I agree. I don’t hate Collins but when there is blame there is blame. It was a terrible idea to bring back Acosta and he should have admitted it and pulled him as soon as a runner got on. As for where was Parnell? Again, I can’t believe Collins used the line of if we had the lead I would have brought in Rauch. Instead I chose to lose.
    - stick May 1, 2012 at 9:26 am
      
      It seems that he was trying to balance the potential of extra innings, vs. having an overused pen. So, he rolled the dice trying to sneak Manny through for 2 innings, and lost.
      
      I can buy letting him go out for the 2nd inning. Only on a short leash.
      
      but yeah, as soon as that first guy got on, he should have gone to Byrdak.
      - trs86 May 1, 2012 at 9:40 am
        
        To me you deal with that on the back end not the front end.
jdon May 1, 2012 at 8:58 am

well, they don’t score runs for him but he has missed a lot of starts for them, so I suppose it is a wash.
srt May 1, 2012 at 9:22 am

While I had a bad feeling with bringing in Acosta for the 2nd inning – even after he looked fine in his first inning of work – if TC had brought in Parnell there and he gave up a run we’d all be complaining how Acosta looked fine, no reason to take him out. Hindsight is 20/20.

This game was definitely winnable. We made Norris look like an ace out there for a long while.
Houston is going to win around 60 games and unfortunately, this was one of them.
- trs86 May 1, 2012 at 9:24 am
  
  I guess but to me Acosta is at best a one inning pitcher and I would rather lose with one of your better pitchers on the mound.
  - srt May 1, 2012 at 9:47 am
    
    Well that was my mindset as well. As soon as I saw Acosta back out there for the 2nd inning I thought: ‘Not sure this is a good idea…..’
stick May 1, 2012 at 9:55 am

considering most BPs suck (outside of maybe 1-2 guys), most managers probably seem like idiots a lot of the time re: pen management.

a lot of damned if you do, damned if you don’t. And they do have to live with ramifications of balancing usage of guys.
Mr North Jersey May 1, 2012 at 11:46 am

Who was that last night Bud Norris or Chuck Norris? Cause his Kung Fu was strong last night.

Acosta comes out for that 2nd inning and gives up the lead run and this time the Mets are unable to come back. Collins postgame remarks was the pen was worn out from the past few days in explaining why he tried to get another inning out of Acosta.

Positives for me was Torres & Nieuwenhuis’s hits to get the Mets back in the game and Ike with 2 hits as he continues to work his way back.

Niese on the hill.

LGM!!

NL East Standings

Team	W	L	Pct.	GB
Braves	24	18	.571	-
Nationals	23	20	.535	1.5
Phillies	20	23	.465	4.5
Mets	16	24	.400	7.0
Marlins	11	32	.256	13.5

Last updated: 05/18/2013

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