Kyle Schwarber Beats Mets Single-Handedly
Nationals take three-of-four to halt Mets' momentum in its tracks
Heading into a big week, a four-game split before departing Washington, DC was likely at the top of the Mets’ to-do list on a sun-splashed Father’s Day in the Northeast.
A mostly listless weekend at the plate was detriment number-one for this team, leaving them in the position they found themselves in for Sunday’s series finale, hoping to scratch out a victory before heading back home.
Francisco Lindor’s two-homer, five-RBI effort in Game 1 on Saturday were the Mets’ first runs scored since the fifth inning on Wednesday versus the Cubs and they didn’t plate another until the bottom of the seventh in their Game 2 loss.
On Sunday, that would need to change. Welcoming the Braves and Phillies into Queens for consecutive four-games-in-three-days series will need all the momentum they can muster.
With Nats’ left-hander Patrick Corbin on the mound — a pitcher the Mets have traditionally tattooed (.257/.321/.461 slash against) — that road was paved in blue and orange bricks.
Whether that path would be traversable would be another question altogether.
Heading into the day, Taijuan Walker’s 2.12 ERA was good for eighth in MLB and his 0.40 home runs allowed per nine innings was tied with teammate Jacob deGrom for second-fewest in baseball.
To say that the 28-year-old right-hander’s been valuable to this group would fall egregiously short of expressing how truly instrumental he's been to this team’s success.
That goes for the entire pitching staff (3.11 ERA leads MLB). Maybe not of late, but there’s no discounting their importance in the Mets building a four-game lead in the division heading into the first day of summer under the constraints they’ve endured.
Things didn’t get off to a great start on Sunday, as Kyle Schwarber led off the bottom of the first with a solo tank job, putting the Mets in an early 1-0 hole, but the deficit was erased in short order.
Kevin Pillar led off the top of the second with an opposite-field solo homer to knot the game at one, taking a meatball-y 90 MPH sinker from Corbin just over the very high wall in right field.
Walker got stuck in some more traffic on the basepaths in the second (Starlin Castro and Victor Robles base hits), but weaved around that with some fine glovework and kept things moving.
Trea Turner singled, stole second, and scored on Josh Bell’s RBI single in the third, putting Washington ahead 2-1. Very nice series for a very fun player (8-for-14, double, home run). Turner’s going to compete for an MVP award someday soon.
Josh Harrison singled to lead off the fourth and advanced to second on a wild pitch, but Walker struck out Castro, flew out Robles, and set down Corbin on strikes to leave him stranded.
Schwarber struck again in the bottom of the fifth, lining a solo shot out to right leading off the frame and putting the Nats up 3-1. He’s on fire these days (four homers in two games). Perfect timing. Sheesh.
Getting the offense going against Corbin was another story.
Pillar’s homer in the second was the only dent they could put in the left-hander’s armor over the first six, with the southpaw setting down 15-of-16 in its wake and 10 in a row heading into the seventh.
With half of the starting lineup about to be turned over and a large contingency of regulars all on track to return to Flushing shortly, this downtick will hopefully be short-lived.
Jeff McNeil will be activated on Monday, Michael Conforto “feels great” and has been running at full speed, and Brandon Nimmo went 1-for-2 in four innings with Syracuse on Sunday. Patience, friends.
Though, in the meantime, wins are necessary to keep pace in a division that remains in flux. A good or bad week for any team outside of Miami will shift the landscape and change the dynamic very fast. Gotta stay on top of these things.
Down by two with three innings to get something going, Pete Alonso crushed a leadoff homer down the left-field line to cut the Nats’ lead to 3-2, ending a homerless drought dating back to June 9 in Baltimore.
A walk to Pillar in the next at-bat ended Corbin’s day, but Kyle Finnegan benefitted from a nice 5-5-3 double play initiated by Castro in the shift to erase him and extinguish that threat.
Walker came back out for the seventh at 82 pitches but a one-out double from Gerardo Parra, who had his contract selected on Sunday, ended his day after 6.1 innings (three earned runs, 10 hits, five strikeouts, no walks; 2.30 ERA).
Walker didn’t appear to have his best stuff on Sunday but, still kept the Mets in the game. That’s all you can ask for. Well, that and runs.
NO! Not like that…
Schwarber connected for his third home run of the day to welcome Jeurys Familia into the game, extending Washington’s lead to 5-2 and, all of a sudden, losing three-of-four to the Nats was staring Luis Rojas’ club in the face.
By the way, at what point do you simply stop throwing fastballs to a guy with a .578 slugging percentage against heaters this season? Asking for a friend.
That 5-2 score would hold up as Brad Hand closed things out for the Nats in perfect fashion. Let’s hope for a turn in the tide as the Mets head back to Citi Field to take on Atlanta for four.
Jacob deGrom is scheduled to start in one of the two games on Monday. We’ll see if that comes to fruition.
Per deGrom, he’s all systems go after following his regular between-start routine. Following two shortened starts, the team would be well within their rights to play things safe and shelve their ace for a start.
That said, no one knows what’s best for Jacob deGrom better than Jacob deGrom. If he says he’s good, so are we.
Happy Father’s Day, family!
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