Mets barely win wild 11-10 slugfest as the club is still uncommitted to trade deadline strategy

Plus, notes on Francisco Alvarez and his continued emergence, and a small update on Edwin Díaz

Michael Baron

Jul 19, 2023

What’s Up with the Mets? ⚾️

The Mets won a wild slugfest at Citi Field 11-10 over the White Sox on Tuesday (Box)
The Mets put up a crooked number in the first inning against Lucas Giolito, notching five runs thanks in part to one of two two-run home runs from Francisco Álvarez and a solo home run from Brett Baty. Álvarez hit his second two-run homer of the night in the sixth inning
DJ Stewart contributed a solo home run of his own in the fourth inning, and Jeff McNeil had an encouraging night with a pair of RBI singles
Mets pitchers had a rough night in large measure - Carlos Carrasco was largely ineffective over 4.2 IP, Grant Hartwig, Trevor Gott, and David Robertson all allowed at least one run in their outings as well
The White Sox plated five runs in the seventh and got the game back to within a run in the ninth after trailing 11-4 before Robertson was able to put out the fire and notch his 13th save of the year
The Mets scored 10+ runs for the seventh time this season, slugged a season-high-tying four home runs for the fourth time, are 11-10 in Interleague games this season, 4-3 against the AL Central, are 38-4 when leading after 7 innings, 37-1 when leading after 8 innings, 8-36 when allowing five or more runs, and 8-4 in July

Trade rumors 🤐

The Mets are still uncommitted to their strategy ahead of the August 1 trade deadline (New York Post)

Injury Updates 🏥

RHP Edwin Díaz (knee surgery) has progressed to throwing from 150 feet on flat ground, although Mets manager Buck Showalter did not say when Díaz might progress to throwing off a mound

Francisco Alvarez… 🧨

Leads all major league catchers in home runs and is second among qualified major league rookies with a .534 SLG and eighth among rookies with 39 RBI
Is the second-fastest Met to reach 20 career homers (74 games)...Pete Alonso reached the 20-career homer mark in 59 games
Is tied for first among all rookies in homers with Josh Jung...Is also second in home runs in July with 7
Via ESPN, Joins Darryl Strawberry (four) and Ed Kranepool (three) as the only Mets with three or more multi-home games before turning 22, Joins Jung and James Outman as the only rookies to have three multi-homer games this season
Is one of three rookies in franchise history to have three multi-homer games in a season...Darryl Strawberry and Pete Alonso each had four such games in their rookie campaigns
Per Elias, yesterday marked the second time in franchise history rookies hit back-to-back home runs (Álvarez and Brett Baty in the first inning)...Mike Jacobs and Victor Diaz hit back-to-back home runs in the second inning on October 2, 2005 vs. Colorado

Today’s Game 🗓

Match-up: Mets (44-50) vs. White Sox (40-56)

Where: Citi Field – Flushing, NY

Starters: RHP Justin Verlander (3-5, 3.72 ERA) vs. RHP Touki Toussaint (0-2, 3.38 ERA)

When: 7:10 PM EDT

Where to Watch: SNY

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Wins are wins, but the flaws remain deep and the Mets have a steep mountain to climb just for a prayer… ✍️

The Mets have won two in a row. But it sure doesn’t feel like it, does it?

Forget all of the noise and distractions around the trade deadline, the flop this team has been and all of the conversations that tend to distract from a club playing the actual game this time of year for a moment. We can talk about all of that again in a bit.

The last two games have been those where you tend to sit there and cringe, grind your teeth, nod at the circus unfolding, games where there are moments your blood pressure elevates suddenly due to something bad happening or something not happening at all that should.

Last night’s game was the 2023 Mets rolled into one, except the Mets actually won the game, albeit barely.

The Mets did hold an 11-4 lead going to the seventh inning, but even the novice of Met fans who have been watching a small fraction of their games this season had to know it wasn’t going to be so easy. Not for this team, not for a group of players who had bumbled their way to baseball irrelevance in their division by July 1 and near irrelevance in a wild card race where it almost seems harder to be out of than in given the qualifications.

But those are the 2023 Mets, the book definition of what the most disappointing team in sports can look like.

So of course, 11-4 in the seventh inning wasn’t as simple as it looked. Between Grant Hartwig and Trevor Gott with a passed ball in between, the Mets allowed five runs to get the White Sox back to within two runs with six outs to go. It was a classic Mets (near) meltdown, a comedy of low quality strikes and an inexcusable passed ball on Francisco Álvarez, the only blemish on an otherwise brilliant night for the rookie catcher.

11-9.

That crooked number - which was or menos neutralized the Mets five-spot in the first inning of this game, forced Buck Showalter to go with David Robertson for a save chance in this game, something it was clear he had hoped not to do given the track this game was taking through it’s first 18 outs. But alas, Robertson was injected into the game in the ninth, and naturally it was a bumpy ride.

He allowed a run and both the tying and go-ahead runs to reach before extinguishing the Mets latest fire in the final third of a game. The Mets won, they won for the second day in a row, they’re 44-50 the same exact record as the Cubs and eight games out of the third wild card spot. There is less than two weeks to go before the trade deadline.

But before we talk about that again, lets discuss Álvarez for a moment.

You see the numbers outlined above. He is on a 162-game pace for 44 home runs in 2023. Aside from that passed ball last night, he has been an elite defender since the day he arrived. He has a 128 wRC+, is hitting .242/.303/.534 with 19 home runs.

The talk of the town among rookies in the National League has been Corbin Carroll, and rightfully so. He has been great and appears to be the entire package.

But honestly, Álvarez is deserving of that conversation too.

I know this doesn’t amount to much, but he has been pretty much the one positive in an otherwise disaster of a season for the Mets. As has always been the case for Álvarez at every level he’s reached, he got off to a slow start in the big leagues offensively before finding his way and catching fire.

From a consistency perspective, Álvarez probably has some work to do, ie get that slash line up a smidge specifically in the batting average and on-base department. But this kid is clearly the total package and so far, living up to the billing of being baseball’s best prospect last year.

As for the Mets as a whole, yes wins are wins but the last two haven’t exactly inspired confidence that any success is sustainable. On Sunday, they got the pitching, but won by virtue of the fact Luis Guillorme couldn’t get a bunt down in the first two pitches of his at-bat, and somehow squeaked a hit by Freddie Freeman at first to plate the ghost runner. Yesterday, they didn’t get the pitching but got the offense, and barely held onto a lead which at one point was at seven late and ended at one.

Wins are wins of course. And if they win 10 in a row, I suppose it doesn’t matter what’s sandwiched into that winning streak because that would get them into the thick of the wild card race. But the deep flaws of this roster are apparent none the less, and from my seat, the Mets would have to get back to at least .500 before August 1 for the Mets to not be looking ahead to 2024.

And even .500 - with all of these flaws - might not be enough, and getting to .500 is a steep mountain to climb at that.

But for a day or two, and hopefully three today, at least there are these positive vibes. It serves as an escape - albeit temporarily - from the reality of this team. And that’s perfectly ok. This is baseball, its supposed to be fun to play and entertaining to watch, and the last two games have been just that.

Even if they’ve been cringeworthy at times.

Around the League 🚩

It was a wild night in Atlanta, but the Diamondbacks prevailed in a 16-13 affair against the Braves on Tuesday at Truist Park
There were a lot of runs in Washington too - the Cubs slugged 20 hits in their 17-3 win over the Nationals
Wilmer Flores slugged two home runs in the Giants wild 11-10 win over the Reds - Cincinnati has now lost six games in a row and have fallen 2.5 games behind the Brewers in the NL Central
The Marlins losing streak is now at 5 games thanks to a 5-2 loss to the lowly Cardinals, who have now won 4 games in a row
The Yankees lost again to the Angels, this time by a score of 5-1 in Anaheim - they are in last place in the AL East with a 50-46 record