NY suffered its first blowout loss in nearly three weeks Monday when they fell 8-1 to the Nationals, and though Tuesday wasn’t a must-win, it represented an important game.
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New York Mets’ Jose Reyes argues a called strike with home plate umpire CB Bucknor, with Washington Nationals catcher Wilson Ramos (40) nearby, during the fifth inning of a baseball game at Nationals Park, Wednesday, Sept. 14, 2016, in Washington.
“I was pleased with the fastball command”, said Latos.
“It doesn’t matter where they put me”, Montero said. If starters Jacob deGrom and Steven Matz can come back quickly and pitch well, the Mets will have one of the deepest, most talented rotations in the Majors and could challenge for the National League pennant in the postseason. Colon uses his pinpoint control to induce weak contact and Syndergaard averages 10.5 strikeouts per nine innings with his nasty fastball/slider combination. He will be reevaluated Tuesday.
“Unbelievable”, Terry Collins said a couple of times afterward, and that pretty much summed up the 4-3 win over the Nationals in 10 innings.
Latos signed with Washington in June after the Chicago White Sox released him.
The offense put the pitching staff in a tight bind, and Gsellman kept pace with Roark to produce his second fantastic outing against the Nationals this month.
But Jay Bruce struck out and T.J. Rivera flew out to end that threat, which was really the only one the Mets had in the game. He has set new personal bests in OPS (.990), doubles (45), triples (5), home runs (25), and RBI (102). Roark (15-8) gave up three hits with seven strikeouts and four walks as he went seven scoreless innings for the ninth time this year, the most in the majors. The right-hander allowed five hits and a walk while striking out four in his second straight no-decision.
“It’s pretty frustrating, because he does have good stuff”, Collins said.
“We had a chance”, Collins said. “Tonight’s a night where we’ve got to cut that back”. After all, somebody finally got Daniel Murphy out when it counted most.
Jose Reyes hit a leadoff double in the first and later scored on a Yoenis Cespedes RBI sac fly to give NY a short-lived 1-0 lead.
Former Mets infielder Wally Backman will not return as the organization’s Triple-A manager in 2017. NY hosts Atlanta April 2. Both have resumed throwing off a mound, so the Mets might have their full complement of starting pitching by the postseason and would be risky, should they get by a wild-card game and advance to a division series against the Chicago Cubs. Manager Terry Collins has lived and died by the long ball all season.
Murphy had singled in his first at-bat, giving him at least one hit all 19 games against the Mets this season. Flores has not played since Saturday. He threw a career-high 96 pitches in that game and 77 on Wednesday.NOTES: Washington manager Dusty Baker was not in the dugout after a death in the family, according to the team.
Mets: RHP Noah Syndergaard (13-8) looks to snap a personal three-game losing streak against the Nationals as he makes his fifth start of the season against the NL East leaders.
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Roark finished that night in NY (0-2) against the Mets this season, in spite of the fact that he had a 1.88 ERA and a.180/.268/.280 line against in 14 ⁄3 IP vs the Nats’ NL East rivals in two starts and one relief appearance this season.
