The Mets lost for the second consecutive night to the Giants, falling 8-5 on Wednesday night at Citi Field. Here are my takeaways from the loss…
Another chapter in a disturbing trend for Matt Harvey.
All was mostly well for Harvey for five innings today. He had allowed two runs thanks to a Joe Panik home run in the first inning. He worked in and out of trouble from the second through fifth innings, but survived despite not missing many bats. Still, he induced nine ground balls through the first five innings, and it looked like this was going to be a good #HarveyDay.
Then came the sixth inning.
He allowed two doubles and two home runs in the sixth inning, amounting to a real crooked number and a three-run deficit for the Mets they simply could not overcome after overcoming the early two-run deficit. He got absolutely shelled and was missing inside the strike zone badly up and over the plate. The Giants had some very comfortable at-bats against him in that inning, meaning Harvey was predictable on top of missing his location up and in the strike zone, and did not adjust and fight his way out of the mess.
The stuff is there, he says he’s healthy, so neither of those are problems. It’s almost as if he’s overthrowing and trying to get six outs on one pitch.
He has to adjust for sure, but he still has to deal with this phase of the recovery from Tommy John Surgery. This is an on-going and year-long process which was talked about in the off-season, and seemingly forgotten about because it’s Matt Harvey and the hype that surrounds him.
It’s easy to forget he’s a human being and even the great ones who have gotten through Tommy John Surgery dealt with some difficult times, specifically in the first year back. That’s not an excuse – it’s just the way it is.
The Mets got some hits and runs today.
They immediately shook off the effects of the no-hitter with two runs against Tim Hudson in the first inning. Then they plated a single run in the fourth inning on an RBI single from Eric Campbell and a single run on an RBI single by Lucas Duda in the fifth inning.
Unfortunately, it wasn’t enough because the Mets didn’t get an effective outing from the starting pitcher tonight. Still it was encouraging in that the middle of the order delivered on a couple of opportunities before Harvey got bombed in the sixth inning.
Now, if the Mets could put a night like this with the bats together with a good outing on the mound, then maybe they’d have something here…
A good test for the Mets, that they’re failing…
The Giants are definitely a good test for the Mets, and this week, its been made abundantly clear how far away they are from their standard of excellence. They hit better, they bunt better, they field better, they execute the little things better – they’re just better.
The sample is getting larger, and it is not really good.
The fact remains this club is 18-26 since starting the year 13-3. Right now, they’re completely out of sync – when they get some offense, they don’t pitch well. When they pitch well, they don’t get any offense. What’s always commonplace for this team is they continue to not turn double plays, play poor defense elsewhere, run the bases poorly, and so on and so forth. Sure, they’ve suffered a ton of injuries, but that’s pretty much what an 18-26 team does.
Other notes from Wednesday:
Harvey fell to 15-1 in his career when the Mets score four or more runs for him in a game.
Harvey now has a 7.20 ERA with eight home runs allowed in 25 innings over his last four starts.
Juan Lagares had two more hits on Wednesday – he is 15-for-41 with 2 doubles, 2 triples, a homer and 3 RBI in his last 11 games.
Ruben Tejada went 0-for-5 on Wednesday – he is 0-for-his-last-13 at the plate.
Despite his fifth inning RBI single, Lucas Duda is just 3-for-his-last-30 with one extra-base hit since May 31, the day he got hit by a pitch in his knee.
The Mets are now 4-12 against San Francisco at Citi Field over the last three years.
Just Mets 