Mets avoid sweep against Angels, and a note about head injuries in MLB

David Peterson allowed just one run over seven innings, and Rafael Ortega delivered the game winning RBI to help the Mets avoid a sweep by the Angels

What’s Up with the Mets? ⚾️

• The Mets walked off the Angels 3-2 when they loaded the bases in the ninth and Rafael Ortega picked up the game winning hit (box)

• It was Ortega’s second career walk-off hit. The first came in 2021 when he hit a walk-off home run against the Rockies when he was with the Cubs

• This was the team’s fifth walk-off victory this season and four of the five have come against interleague opponents

• They snapped a nine-game losing streak against American League teams. Their last victory against the AL came on July 25 against the Yankees

• LHP David Peterson shut down Shohei Ohtani and the Angels. He gave up just one run in seven innings and struck out eight. Ohtani went 0-for-4 with two strikeouts for the day

• Despite getting hit in the head the previous game, Pete Alonso was in the lineup and went 2-for-4 with a game-tying RBI double

• Francisco Álvarez snapped an 0-for-11 streak with a RBI single in the fourth

• SS Francisco Lindor extended his hit streak to 13 games with a single in the eighth inning. It is the second longest hit streak of his career and he tied the longest of his Mets career.

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Roster Moves 📰

• INF Mark Vientos activated from the injured list

• INF Abraham Almonte designated for assignment

• LHP Adam Kolarek designated for assignment

• RHP Tyson Miller claimed by Dodgers

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Prospect Watch 🔎

• C Kevin Parada (No. 5 prospect, Single-A): 1-for-4

• OF/SS Jett Williams (No. 3 prospect, Single-A): 0-for-3, BB

• OF Ryan Clifford (No. 6 prospect, Single-A): 0-for-3, BB

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Today’s Game 🗓

Match-up: Mets (60-71) vs. Rangers (73-57)

Where: Citi Field — Flushing, NY

Starting pitchers: RHP Tylor Megill (7-7, 5.54 ERA) vs. RHP Jon Gray (8-7, 3.76 ERA)

When: 7:10 PM EDT

Where to Watch: WPIX

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David Peterson… 🗒️

• Over his last 14 outings, the southpaw owns a 2.78 ERA

• This was Peterson’s first quality start since June 27 against the Brewers

• Sunday was his fourth career start of seven or more innings and his first at

  Citi Field (Last: 6/26/22 at Miami)

• He has a 2.61 ERA at Citi Field this season

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It’s time for Major League Baseball to do something about head injuries… ✍️

During Saturday’s Mets and Angels game, there were two scary incidents that involved a player getting hit in the head with a baseball.

The first was a freak incident where starting pitcher Chase Silseth was hit in the head by an errant throw by Trey Cabbage across the diamond.

A few innings later, Pete Alonso was struck in the back of the head by a pitch which lead to both benches clearing. After the game, Mets manager Buck Showalter said “We might have gotten lucky, again. But how many times can you be lucky?”

Following the incident with Alonso, Mets broadcaster Ron Darling became infuriated on-air about the incident and the question remains why is Major League Baseball waiting until luck runs out before they intervene? Thankfully, both Alonso and Silseth are on the mend, but every day that objects traveling at speeds of over 95 miles per hour are hurled at players on the field is a risk to the players who play the sport.

Baseball touts itself as a non-contact sport but accidents still happen as well as those of the intentional variety. The players are bigger, stronger, and both hitting and throwing the ball harder than they ever have before at all levels of the sport. And the pitchers specifically are throwing harder than ever before while teams focus on velocity and not control when young pitchers get called up. Retaliation on the field is not the answer since that just compounds the problem by risking another player’s health in a different way.

This isn’t just to protect the batters - pitchers get visibly shaken when they accidentally hurt someone too. The mental toll it could take on both the pitcher and the hitter can adversely impact players on both sides of the ball. The Mets saw this when Jacob Webb accidentally hit Kevin Pillar in the face with a pitch that got away from him. Webb was nearly in tears after the incident and afterwards Pillar went out of his way to absolve Webb of any blame.

These incidents are happening far too frequently for MLB to continue to ignore the problem.

The implementation of a seven-day concussion list was a step in the right direction, but there needs to be stiffer penalties for pitchers who hit players in the head whether it is intentional or not. This is the major leagues - organizations need to better emphasize command and control at the higher levels of the minor leagues rather than sheer velocity so that when they get to the big leagues, they have better command and a better idea where those pitches are going, thus creating a safer playing environment for all of their players.

After all, it doesn’t matter how hard a pitcher throws if he or she can’t throw it for a strike.

MLB can also penalize pitchers for balls thrown at hitters heads. Freak accidents will unfortunately still happen, and while this could be seen as a punishment for the pitcher, they could benefit from it as well to have a mental reset and have the confidence to throw their pitches where they want again.

With science advancing and with everything we know now about head injuries, every precaution should be taken and head injuries should be treated seriously by both the organizations and the league. Commissioner Rob Manfred has had no issue creating new rules for the game so there should be more of a push to implement ones that increase the safety of the players.

That way, the league will be actively protecting their players instead of just relying on luck when a player steps into the batters box.

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Around the League 🚩

• The Mariners are now alone in first place for the first time all season, after wiping out a ten-game deficit to pass the Rangers

• The Guardians designated old friend Noah Syndergaard for assignment

• Angels RHP Chase Silseth is back with the team after being struck in the head by an errant throw

• The Oakland Athletics were the first team officially eliminated from playoff contention after their 6-1 loss against the White Sox. They set a new club record for the earliest date of being knocked out of playoff contention by beating last year’s Athletics team by one day

• The Rays and Yankees got into a benches clearing incident after five batters were hit in the game

• Little Leaguer Louis Lappe hit a walk-off home run to seal the Little League World Series Championship for the team from California to defeat Curacao