Starting a nine-game homestand, the Mets got off to a bad start. The Dodgers defeated them 9-4. Josh Beckett collected the win. Rafael Montero, making his second major league start, got the loss, not having his best stuff. He lasted only 4.1 innings, giving up five earned runs on seven hits and four walks.
The Dodgers opened the scoring on a pitcher base hit (it seems torturous every time this happens against the Mets) by Josh Beckett in the second inning. Quickly, in the bottom frame, Wilmer Flores singled home Curtis Granderson to tie the game at one.
The game remained knotted at one until the fifth inning when things fell apart for Montero. He walked Puig to open the inning. Two batters later, Adrian Gonzalez hit a two-run homer. Matt Kemp then doubled and Carl Crawford drove him in. Montero was pulled, and Jeurys Familia would allow the inherited runner, Crawford, to score through a stolen base, wild pitch, and base hit by Juan Uribe. It was 5-1 Dodgers at this point.
The Dodgers added a sixth run in the sixth inning off Carlos Torres. It would prove to be a useful tack-on run because the Mets would find some power in the bottom of the sixth. Curtis Granderson hit a solo home run and Lucas Duda hit a two-run home run to cut the Dodgers lead to 6-4.
The Mets didn’t lack the chances to score more runs. Four times they came to the plate with the bases loaded, and failed to execute in all four at-bats. In the fifth, they loaded the bases for Daniel Murphy and David Wright. An ideal situation. Murphy struck out swinging. Wright grounded out to second. In the seventh, they loaded the bases once again, this time, for Lucas Duda and Wilmer Flores. Duda flied out. Flores grounded out.
By the ninth, the game was starting to feel too long as it approached four hours. In fact, it turned out to be the second longest nine-inning game in Mets history, as the Dodgers added a few more runs for good measure.
The Mets will look to recover tomorrow when Jacob deGrom faces off against Hyun-Jin Ryu.
