3 Up, 3 Down: Mets Blow Another Chance to Win A Series

When the New York Mets are in a funk, it’s often as hard for a writer to put pen to paper (or to type the words) as it is for the reader to focus on them. The weekend series against the Nationals seemed to have the possibility of finally giving some cause for optimism after the Mets won two of the first three. Alas, the series was a wraparound, and David Peterson killed that dream faster than you can say “minors.” The Mets failed to win their sixth consecutive series.

3 Up

Two Stellar Starting Efforts

The meltdown of the Mets’ starting rotation has been one of the most disappointing parts of their early season. Despite injuries, the team thought it had the depth to weather storms and has seemingly been sorely mistaken. That was not necessarily disproven in this series, but they did get a pair of much-needed decent outings.

A five-inning, one-earned-run effort from Tylor Megill was actually enough to earn a victory, as was Max Scherzer‘s five-inning, one-run performance. It remains highly imperfect: Megill threw 93 pitches in those five innings and continued his WHIP problem by allowing four hits and four walks, while Scherzer got into trouble in the second, putting the Mets in another early hole. Still, the team will take it and just hope that the pair can build upon whatever modest success they found. Scherzer threw 50 strikes out of 83 pitches, and his velocity ticked back up from his previous start.

Nimmo Sparks Rallies

Brandon Nimmo seems to be coming out of his funk, as he had another strong series. He went 6-for-17 in total and scored the go-ahead run on a three-run single from Francisco Lindor in the opener. He added a sac fly in his first at-bat continuing Saturday’s suspended game, immediately knotting the game at one. He also had an RBI single in the third to push across the go-ahead run and buoy the Mets’ eight-run fifth.

Whatever the sluggers have been doing (or not) behind him, Nimmo is getting back in gear.

Some Bullpen Wins

Lost in the Mets’ suspended-game defeat was how good a job their bullpen did, relatively speaking. After the umpires mismanaged Saturday’s suspended game, Buck Showalter was forced to use his bullpen for six innings in the first of a twin bill. All told, Stephen Nogosek, Dominic Leone, and Dennis Santana combined to allow two runs on six hits with one walk and three strikeouts. Despite Leone’s surrendering the go-ahead home run to C.J. Abrams just after the Mets had tied it up, this game, on the whole, cannot be blamed on the pitching. The bullpen trio did yeoman’s work.

In the opener, Jeff Brigham, Adam Ottavino, David Robertson, and Drew Smith all tossed zeroes at the Nationals, backing up the Mets’ razor-thin lead. Robertson worked five outs before tiring at 40 pitches in the ninth, forcing Smith into the game with runners on first and second and two outs. Smith struck out Lane Thomas to end the threat and earn his first career save.

The third game of the series was already in mostly comfortable territory by the time the bullpen got involved, although things did get slightly dicey. After Scherzer left the game, Brooks Raley danced around three walks to keep Washington off the board, but Zach Muckenhirn got into some trouble in the eighth. He allowed a run and loaded the bases but got Thomas to ground out, ending the mini-threat. Muckenhirn finished the game.

While Tommy Hunter did allow four runs in three innings in the finale, the game was already pretty far out of reach beforehand. Hunter essentially filled the punter role for Buck Showalter, enabling him to save his other relievers from further work.

Aside from Hunter, Mets relief pitchers threw 14 innings, allowing three runs on 11 hits, seven walks, and 14 strikeouts. That’s a good sign, regardless of whom it’s against, and even though the walk numbers are way too high.

3 Down

First Inning Woes

The Nationals scored a first-inning run in three of the four games, adding to the Mets’ streak of digging a hole early. There’s something seemingly symbolic about the reversal of last season’s trend when the Mets gave other teams fits in the first inning. It wasn’t all bad: the Mets did make MacKenzie Gore work in the first inning on Friday night and ended up chasing him after four innings even though they did not score against him.

Still, the Mets have been outscored 37-9 in the first inning this season. They might want to start thinking about a different way to set up the team for success, particularly since the first inning tends to be the highest-scoring inning across baseball each year.

Runs Still At a Premium

Despite the Mets’ eight-run outburst in the fifth inning of the third game, they still struggled to score runs in this series. Other than that barrage, the Mets played 35 innings and scored eight runs, an average of 2.0 runs per nine innings. That is an absolute bottom-of-the-barrel performance by the offense, even if the overall series averages (4.0 runs per game) don’t seem as terrible.

As constituted, this team has so little margin for error: when either their hitting or their pitching is up to snuff, they must win to salvage the all-too-many games when all aspects of the team are crumbling. The Mets thought they had built a team predicated on pitching but still able to win on the offensive side. That has not been the case at all in the early going.

Not a Major League Pitcher

Peterson seemingly does something more shockingly awful every time he pitches. Somehow, he managed to raise his ERA in this game when it came in at 7.71. He put the Mets in a hole from the get-go once more, then abruptly gave up two runs in the third and fourth to put the game out of reach (for this iteration of the Mets, anyway). He added another run in the fifth for good measure.

The Mets may seemingly not have a choice, but they can’t keep running Peterson out there. Denyi Reyes and José Butto have at least had their moments this season; Peterson is a guaranteed blow-up every single time he takes the mound.

It’s hard to understand what happened to Peterson this season. Still, the Mets are becoming a lollipop team when he pitches. Common sense would dictate leaving him in the minors regardless of need at this point. The Mets are more likely to catch lightning in a bottle elsewhere than to fix Peterson’s issues on the fly.

The Mets head home for a series with the MLB-leading Tampa Bay Rays beginning on Tuesday.