Punch And Punchy

Over the final 5 games of this 6 game homestand, the Mets scored a grand total of 9 runs. It should come as no surprise that their record in said 5 games was 1-4. The numbers are positively 2015.

The finale of this stretch was a real humdinger of a game, a total shit show that lasted 4 hours and 41 minutes, ran 13 innings, and was decided by Colon-like Pitcher Matt Albers drilling his first hit since 2007 and eventually scoring the game's winning run in a 2-1 mess of a game.

Lost in the box score, then, was Jacob deGrom's best outing of the season, a sterling 7-inning effort that saw him regain some of the luster he'd been lacking at times this season, giving up 5 hits, walking 2 and striking out 10. Unfortunately, in that 7th inning, he allowed a Home Run to Todd Frazier, a real sin of a thing to do because the Mets had already plated their daily run and he clearly needed to make it stand up.

So, 1-1, and away we went. As this was an afternoon game, I was relegated to sporadically following things on Gamecast, but, as usual, I have work that gets in the way, so after seeing 1-1 in the 7th inning, by time I looked again it was 1-1 in the 10th inning, followed by 1-1 in the 12th inning. This, I suppose, shouldn't have been much of a surprise. Once again operating with a short bench and a lineup that lacked Yoenis Cespedes, the Mets trotted out a lineup that included Ty Kelly, Rene Rivera, James Loney and Juan Lagares. Combine that with Michael Conforto earning the dreaded Golden Sombrero and Curtis Granderson hitting .211, and, well, you know where this is going.

I'm sure plenty of people decided instead to complain about the bullpen blowing the game again, but, much like Tuesday night, how much of that is true? Addison Reed, Jeurys Familia, Antonio Bastardo and Jim Henderson allowed a whole lot of nothing over their innings of work, and Hansel Robles also didn't give anything up, but I'm told he left with an injury so maybe that's got something to do with it. Logan Verrett was probably thrown in in the 12th with instructions to just suck it up, and he was well on his way to doing so until Albers stole the show by hitting a double to lead off the 13th, moved to 3rd when an obviously stunned Verrett threw a Wild Pitch, and then scored on a Sac Fly by Jose Abreu. Given Albers physical appearance and the fact that he's been an American League pitcher his entire career, I suppose this must be the White Sox version of a Bartolo Colon Home Run. It certainly seems to be the story of this game.

And that only underscores the problem. This is kind of embarrassing.