Mets blow late lead to the Rangers, but some real positives came out of Monday's game
Mets blow late lead to the Rangers, but some real positives came out of Monday's game
Trevor Gott allowed two runs in the ninth, allowing Texas to comeback and win
What’s Up with the Mets? ⚾️
The Mets lost to the Rangers 4-3 at Citi Field on Monday (box)
Tylor Megill started for the Mets and pitched very well, allowing just a run on five hits with eight strikeouts in six innings
The Mets bullpen did not perform well in relief of Megill, allowing three runs over the game’s final three innings including two runs in the ninth against Trevor Gott, turning a 3-2 lead into a 4-3 deficit
Brandon Nimmo snapped his 0-for-21 cold stretch with a two-run home run in the third inning
DJ Stewart also homered, giving him six home runs in August 15 which are the second-most in MLB during that span
The Mets are now 10-17 in August, 20-20 in one-run games, 5-5 vs the AL West, 11-48 when scoring three runs or less, and 18-24 since the All-Star Game
Prospect Watch 🔎
All Mets minor league affiliates were off on Monday.
Today’s Game 🗓
Match-up: Mets (60-72) vs. Rangers (74-57)
Where: Citi Field — Flushing, NY
Starting pitchers: LHP Andrew Heaney (9-6, 4.34 ERA) vs. LHP José Quintana (1-5, 3.73 ERA)
When: 7:10 PM EDT
Where to Watch: SNY
The one good thing about Monday’s game… ✍️
First off, that was a crap loss for the Mets. But those tend to happen more often than not when the bullpen is in fragments and they have no closer.
And in truth, they haven’t had a closer all year, at least not since theirs went down with a knee injury in a non-major league game or setting back in mid-March.
Anyway, I digress.
I am also not going to get into the Q&A with Max Scherzer yesterday. It was a rinse and repeat media session where he said exactly what he’s already said on a number of occasions about the situation with the Mets. I am also not going to address the repeated questions about the toxic clubhouse, because that’s pointless too.
I will say thought that it’s funny how when teams are good, people think the clubhouse is the place to be and everybody gets along. And when teams are bad, people think it’s that the clubhouse is bad and toxic, nobody is friends and instead, everyone is fighting behind closed doors.
Here’s the thing about all of that.
Neither are necessarily true in either case.
But one thing that is true is that when teams are good, it’s because the team has good players in every area of the roster. When teams are bad, it’s because they don’t have good players in every area of the roster.
I’ll take the latter of that as the explanation as to why the Mets stunk in 2023.
I’m also not going to address the rumors around Pete Alonso and the Mets possibly trading him this winter. I did that already, it’s here, and feel free to read that.
Back to last night…
Yeah, the Mets lost and lost in a crummy way. But the good thing is through the loss we learned some things, both good and bad. And right now, the Mets need to be learning about every single player on this roster (and perhaps a player or two in the minor leagues who need to be on this roster) so they know what they have among the pieces who are here going into this transition process over the next couple of years.
Or rebuild, or whatever they want to call it.
The greatest takeaway last night was unquestionably Tylor Megill. I’d even argue it was his best start to-date as a Met not just because of the numbers or the length of the outing, but primarily because he was able to maintain his fastball velocity from end-to-end in this game and against a very difficult lineup to navigate at that. He looked poised, looked confident, and for the first time in a while, looked like he knew what the hell he was doing out there.
He ran out of gas in the end of his outing and just lost his location a bit, but I loved his fastball-centric approach and his willingness to be aggressive throughout the night. He didn’t get a lot of swings and misses on that pitch but that’s ok - he would go to his slider for out pitches when he needed to and the strategy worked. If he can just get that slider to be a little more back-foot on a routine basis, he would then have two high-quality big league pitches to build on going forward.
And that’s the key - building for Megill.
Can he now translate this into his next start against Seattle, another tough lineup which has been red hot?
That’s what we are trying to do here - learn about what they have going forward. And it’s a big learning moment for Megill and the Mets.
Around the League 🚩
Ronald Acuña, Jr. stole his 60th base, doubled, went 4-for-5 with 5 RBI and 4 runs scored, and Atlanta routed the Rockies 14-4 at Coors Field
Julio Rodriguez had 4 more hits, drove in 3 and scored 3 as the Mariners shutout the A’s 7-0 in Oakland
José Altuve hit for the cycle as the Astros routed the Red Sox 13-5 at Fenway
The Phillies overcame an early deficit to rally and beat the Angels 6-4 thanks to homers from Trea Turner (2) and Bryce Harper