The Mets failed to handle the baseball with care on Tuesday. Tyrone Taylor lost sight of it. Marcus Semien bobbled it and threw it wildly. Luis Torrens didn’t catch it (twice).
The irresponsibility came at the worst time.
With two outs and the bases loaded in the second inning, James Wood drove an 85 mph Nolan McLean sweeper 379 feet to the left-field wall. Nick Morabito, making his MLB debut 2.5 miles away from his high school, raced to the fence and nearly pulled off a one-handed, leaping catch. The ball hit his glove, but he couldn’t hold on and it caromed away while Taylor stood still and Wood circled the bases.
“He lost track of the baseball,” Carlos Mendoza told reporters after the 9-6 loss to the Nationals. “He went after and then he didn’t know where the ball was. That’s a tough break there.” By the time Morabito got to the ball and threw it in, there was no chance to get Wood at the plate. The inside-the-park grand slam pulled the Nats to within 5-4.
With first and third in the third, Torrens allowed a passed ball that gave the Nats a 6-5 lead and put in a runner in scoring position. That runner came home later in the inning on a sacrifice fly.
Then came the fourth, which Mendoza charitably described as “not good” after the game.
Photo Credit: Rafael Suanes-Imagn Images
José Tena bounced a potential inning-ending double play ball to second, but Semien booted it, then threw wide of Bo Bichette in an attempt for the force at second. Semien’s first error of the season put runners on second and third. With the infield in, CJ Abrams grounded to short, Bichette threw home and the ball hit Torrens in the glove, but he didn’t squeeze it and two runs scored to make it 9-5 Nats.
“The past four days or so, making errors on routine plays,” Mendoza said. “We’re a good team defensively, and we’ve shown that … but we’re going through a stretch right now where we got to clean that up.”
The Mets (21-27) rank 23rd in outs above average, (negative-8) which measures range, 22nd in fielding run value (negative-6), which includes throwing, blocking, framing, arm and range, and 23rd in an overall defense (negative-4.9), per FanGraphs. New York has committed 26 errors, which is tied for the ninth most in the league with the Rockies.
