As has been the case on too many occasions in 2015, the New York Mets gave away runs and a game on Friday night as the Braves came from behind to defeat the Mets 2-1 in the eighth inning.
For the third time in a week, the Mets lost a game while leading after seven innings – they are now 32-3 when leading after seven.
How it all started.
With the Mets leading 1-0 and Jacob deGrom still on the mound in the bottom of the eighth Andrelton Simmons – who is now 15-for-35 with four runs scored and six RBI against the Mets this season – led off the eighth inning with his 14th double of the year.
The misplayed sacrifice bunt by Ruben Tejada.
Eury Perez was the next batter, and he gave himself up for a sacrifice bunt. DeGrom went to field the bunt to the right of the mound, but the ball was hit hard enough for deGrom to have an easy play on Simmons at third.
However, after look towards third, deGrom realized he had no play, as Tejada did not retreat to third base after realizing deGrom would field the bunt, leaving third base vacated and forcing deGrom to throw to first. He barely got Perez.
“[Tejada] did the right thing,” Terry Collins said. “He’s got to go get the ball. We’re trying to get an out there. I’m not worried about anything else. If this guy bunts the ball too hard and Ruben doesn’t come after it, and if Jake doesn’t get it, we’ve got first and third. We’ve got a big situation. He did the right thing. We made the right play.”
“I was just trying to get off there quick and hopefully maybe have a chance at third,” DeGrom said. “But it was hit pretty hard, so Ruben’s got to come in on that just in case I don’t get it. He put down a good bunt, which made Ruben come in, and we didn’t have a play there, so I got the out at first.”
It’s not that Tejada should not have charged. It’s that Tejada clearly did not read the ball or deGrom’s angle/speed towards the ball well enough to know deGrom would get to it. The right play is for Duda to charge, Dilson Herrera to cover first and leave second base vacated and for Tejada to see that and retreat to third rather than continue to charge. If the ball was hit more towards the line, then it becomes a perfect sac bunt by Perez and that’s when the Mets could have tipped their cap to the Braves.
It’s just a matter of inexperience for Tejada at third base on that play. It’s not totally his fault – he’s being asked to do something he has about two weeks of experience at in his pro career. In fairness, he was fantastic at third outside of that play last night, and has done a nice job generally in what is a completely new position for him.
At the end of the day, however, that becomes an out the Mets simply gave away, regardless of the explanation, which while not illogical, doesn’t make what happened right.
The infield in.
Next up was Pedro Ciriaco with one out and the tying run at third. The Mets brought the infield in, and deGrom induced a weak ground ball to Wilmer Flores at shortstop.
Flores did the right thing to look Simmons back to third, but for some reason he double-clutched and threw deliberately to first base, and Ciriaco beat out the weak ground ball for an infield single.
“That’s the second out of the inning,” Collins said. “It kind of takes the starch out of things.”
Instead of having a runner at third and two out, the Braves had runners at the corners and one out.
“I thought [Simmons] was going on contact. Just my mistake not knowing how fast the runner was,” Flores explained of his mental mistake. “I just took too long to throw to first. Obviously games like this, any mistake will cost you. It happened.”
That it did. Friday night’s mistake for Flores was a very poor mental mistake. There’s no excusing what happened, and at least he owned up to it and didn’t make any excuses for the blunder.
Unfortunately for the Mets, the mistake is a part of a very long line of defensive miscues, mental mistakes, and issues regarding poor range and footwork not just for Flores, but Daniel Murphy, Dilson Herrera, and even David Wright the last time the Mets were in Atlanta.
It was the second out the Mets gave away in the inning, which was the fifth or sixth out the Mets have given away over the last week.
The pitching change.
With 97 pitches under his belt, showing no signs of fatigue and having done nothing wrong, Terry Collins decided to lift deGrom from the game and hand over the mess to Sean Gilmartin to face lefty Jace Peterson.
“He’s at 97 pitches, 90 degrees out,” Collins explained. “He hung the slider to Simmons. He got the ball up to Perez, even though he was bunting. I just thought it was time. If he’d have got Ciriaco out, he would have stayed in to face the next guy. One out, I was looking for a strikeout.”
In fairness to Gilmartin, left-handed hitters were hitting .229 coming into the game against him, and Gilmartin had most certainly earned higher leverage situations. And if he answers Collins’ call and gets Peterson, perhaps this isn’t as big of a discussion point.
However, deGrom was the best pitcher available to Collins in that situation, the 97 pitches under his belt not withstanding.
The double.
Gilmartin was unable to get Peterson, who delivered a double over the head of Juan Lagares.
“I had no chance at that ball,” Lagares explained. “He crushed that ball … I played a little shallow. He’s a leadoff guy, and the infield played in. There’s nothing I can do about that.”
He’s right. Even at 100 percent, Lagares would have no chance at it. It would’ve taken a miracle, Willie Mays-like catch to make that play, and it would have tied the game at a minimum.
Besides, with all of the blunders on the infield, the game might have been lost anyway.
The forgotten E9.
None of this includes Curtis Granderson’s dropped popup in right field which forced deGrom to throw about seven extra pitches in that inning and might have been the difference between staying in and coming out in the eighth inning.
In retrospect, it was a huge play.
This is just the latest in what has been a multitude of games in which the defense has failed the club. Assuming nothing changes, it won’t be the last time this season either. Unfortunately, it is very much a part of their 36-33 record, which was unfortunately predicted well before the season began.
If the foundation of the club is going to be built on power-armed pitchers, it is absolutely vital the Mets get better infield defense. There is no rationalizing it with a few of the fly ball pitchers they have, or hoping one guy or another outhits their defensive deficiencies, mainly because nobody on the team has done that, to be quite frank.
It’s not just the physical mistakes and limitations with these guys – it’s the mental mistakes, the mis-positioning, and the overall process which is flawed with this defense.
It’s just not going to work, and this just isn’t survivable in a 162 game season.
Just Mets 
4 responses to “The Mets attempt at explaining the eighth inning on Friday”
Hi Mike – Your reviews are insightful and your effort second-to-none. I agree with practically everything you said, except Tejada’s purported failure to retreat to 3rd base. I believe it reveals a lack of coaching on the issue and not execution on the part of the player. Tejada was one of the game’s heroes.
Collins judgement needs to be called into question in a dispositive way. He deprived deGrom – on his birthday no less – of controlling his own fate in an inning that was spinning out of control through no fault of his own. In doing so, he not only exposed deGrom to an ill-deserved defeat, he also sent the wrong message to the entire rotation.
Inexplicably, Collins brought in Familia – his CLOSER – after the lead had been surrendered. The Baseball God’s promptly rewarded Collins with an injured closer. (Yes, Michael, there are Baseball Gods).
Upon Murphy’s return, the only responsible interim solution is to put Murphy at 3rd base, Tejada at SS and Flores at 2nd. Herrera is very talented, but probably not ready for prime time.
Meanwhile, as Conforto continues his meteoric rise through the ranks, the moment he is MLB-ready, Granderson needs to be DFA’d. I’d rather see Kirk (using a lighter bat for better bat control) in right field – better range, better arm and probably a better stick with a little re-tooling.
Last night’s defeat was truly disturbing for many reasons. I hope fundamental changes will be made, beginning with replacing TC with Wally… which is probably a good place to start.
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Agree on your new infield, but I wonder what Murph would have done last night when deGrom fielded that bunt….. He is the king of mental mistakes, after all.
Conforto needs to go to AAA first, and then get brought up. Granderson will not be released, but he should never start vs. LHers!
And, yes, Terry should be DFA’d. Sigh…..
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Left-handed hitters are hitting .237 against deGrom, so Terry’s match-up mania was uncalled for, as Jake was doing fine (except for the terrible fielders around him).
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Those who think Collins should be fired are ignoring one big piece of fact, the Wilpons’ will never give their blessing. Even if the Mets season falls off a cliff he won’t be replaced because he is a yes man, which is exactly what they want. Alderson hasn’t made a trade for position player help because the owners will never sign off on it.
Those people dreaming of having Backman as the manager can forget it, it will never happen. This team is built as a flawed collection of either not ready for prime time players and over the hill stars for the most part because that is all the owners can afford. Think of it Gee was DFA’d close to a week or so ago, why hasn’t he been either dealt or waived? The answer is easy, no one wants to trade for guy making 5.8 mil who can’t pitch more than 3 innings, and the team knows that if they expose him to waivers, no one will pick him up and he will go to LV, and the Wilpons’ will still be stuck with his salary. Remember this is an ownership group who decided rather than write a 5 mil check to Bobby Bonilla, they would rather pay him 29 mil or so over 20 years. They are not smart owners , baseball wise or fiscally. Alderson needs to be fired, simply because he won’t tell to owners to spend money. Hell, these are owners who devalued the franchise simply so they could pay Nelson Doubleday less money when buying him out.
This will not get any prettier no matter how you dress up this pig, this team is completely flawed and that falls at the feet of the owners and Alderson. Hell, I am surprised Collins has stayed as long as he has, as much as I hate his managerial style he deserves better.
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