Two For The...?

Tuesday had the makings of total disaster for the Mets. Consider the circumstances: Out of sorts after a long road trip, playing a team that they historically have not done well against, in their own building full of fans of said opponent, playing a doubleheader that would begin with about 40 people in the stands, and so on and so forth.

The first game seemed to be the embodiment of all of these problems. Noah Syndergaard dug his own hole, first by essentially beaning Yadier Molina on a throw home to attempt a fielder's choice in the 2nd inning, and then by allowing a 2-run Home Run to Jedd Gyorko, the San Diego expatriate (who was good and then wasn't and now is a Cardinal, so just watch him hit 30 Home Runs this season), in the 3rd. The Mets best recourse was to score 2 runs on a Rene Rivera Home Run and then proceed to leave 16 men in scoring position against Carlos Martinez and others, including Tyler Lyons, Tyler Siegrist and Seung Hwan Oh. Which means that the Cardinals have decided to turn back the clock to 2006, when they similarly had a bullpen full of guys named Tyler. And then Oh. Whoever he is.

Trying to force an issue in the 9th, Curtis Granderson decided to try and tag up from 1st on a Yoenis Cespedes fly ball and got thrown out. That kind of summed up the day game, a 3-2 Mets loss where nothing went right and dumb shit happened. Oh.

So, the Mets lost the game that their best Pitcher started, which is demoralizing in and of itself, and then they had to go back out and play another game against the same Cardinals with their same dopey fans littering the building. There were only 40 people in the seats at the beginning of the 1st game, and no, I wasn't there, nor was I watching on TV, I just know what happens when you start a game at 4:10 on about 20 hours notice. Nobody shows up. Fans either decide they'll just show up for the nightcap, or they're blissfully unaware that there's a Doubleheader and they're wondering why the game is in the 7th inning when they showed up. Either way, Bartolo Colon pitched for the Mets in the nightcap and just like Syndergaard, he gave up a Home Run to Gyorko early in the game, because of course he did.

Unlike the 1st game, Gyorko's Home Run ended up being all the offense the wonderful Cardinals were able to muster off of Colon. It took the Mets a while to get going, but eventually they did reach Jaime Garcia for some runs. In the 3rd, the Mets tied the game when Asdrubal Cabrera got his first hit with a man in scoring position in about 2 months, doubling off the wall to score Alejandro De Aza. In the 4th, the Mets did not get a hit with a man in scoring position, but James Loney hit into a Double Play with no outs and Wilmer Flores on 3rd, and Flores scored to give the Mets the lead. In the 5th, Cabrera did not get a hit with 1 out and De Aza on 3rd, but he did hit a Sacrifice Fly to score De Aza and extend the Mets lead. 

Colon then did the rest, in a rather vintage Colon performance in which he just goes out, throws strikes and by time you look up he's gotten through 7 innings, allowing 1 run on 3 hits and strikes out 8. Addison Reed for the 8th, Jeurys Familia for the 9th, a 3-1 win and, amazingly, a split of this Doubleheader, which I guess is about as good as you can ask for.

The next thing I'd ask for, of course, would be for the Mets to break this win-loss-win-loss trend and win again tomorrow since I'll be at the game. That'd be nice.