The Mets dropped their seventh straight game on Friday night, again in frustrating fashion, this time to the Pittsburgh Pirates.
Right-hander Taylor Megill had gotten off to a good start on the mound and the offense scratched across a pair of runs against the left-hander Rich Hill. Then, the Mets’ defense took a turn for the worst.
“We play a little bit better defensively behind him and it might be a different situation,” Buck Showalter said postgame. “Some physical plays that we normally make and we didn’t make them, that’s one of the more disappointing things.”
It started in the bottom of the second when Starling Marte pulled up on an Austin Hedges liner, which landed fair and ducked out of play for a two-run ground-rule double, giving Pittsburgh the lead.
After Francisco Lindor homered, evening things at two, things went sour again.
With one on and one out in the third, Carlos Santana rolled what should’ve been an inning-ending double play, but Lindor booted it to extend the inning. Megill walked the next batter on four pitches to load the bases, followed by a two-run single.
Ji Hwan Bae then dropped down a bunt and advanced all the way to third on an Eduardo Escobar throwing error. After Josh Palacios brought home the fifth run of the inning, Megill was able to get Hedges to ground into a double play to end the threat.
“It’s unacceptable,” a frustrated Lindor said while discussing his error postgame. “It’s a flat-out mental mistake, I rushed the play. That’s been my mistakes this year, trying to finish the play without having the baseball in my glove.
“Mental mistakes like that, they can’t happen. I will make another error, guaranteed, but mental mistakes like that can’t happen,” he added. “Today’s on me. That play right there was going to close out the inning, today’s on me.”
It wasn’t all on Lindor, though, as things spiraled from there and New York went on to lose 14-7 in embarrassing fashion.
The Mets now sit four games under .500 for the first time all season. After being swept by the Atlanta Braves, a series in which they led by three runs in every game, they came out tonight and were dominated by Pittsburgh in a laugher.
While Lindor has no answers for the continued struggles, he knows things need to change in a hurry.
“I want to say it’s part of the season but I’ve been saying that way too long. It’s time to turn the page. It’s time to be better, we got to be better. Plain and simple we have to be better, I have to be better.”