TL;DR: Both offenses struggled to convert opportunities, both bullpens faltered, and the D-Backs survived a wild end.
I need everyone to take a deep breath. The collective torture session that baseball can be is over – at least until tomorrow afternoon. This had to be one of the most stressful games so far this season – especially given how frustrating the last 12 days have been for the team during which they’ve gone just 4-7. Regardless, it had to feel good to end the month on a high note against one of the league’s best teams through the first month. It was not a smooth ride by any means either as the game featured more traffic on the basepaths than the Long Island Expressway after work. The two teams combined to leave 19 runners on base for the game and went a collective 1-for-15 with runners in scoring position. I’ll leave it to you on whether that performance lies more with the batters failing to execute or the pitchers doing the opposite.
That dynamic got started immediately as Corbin Burnes loaded the bases with just one out with a leadoff double to Francisco Lindor and consecutive walks to Pete Alonso and Mark Vientos. However, Burnes looked much sharper against Starling Marte as he got him to swing over a nasty slider to strikeout and induced a weak groundout from Jeff McNeil to keep the Mets off the scoreboard in the first. It was more of the same throughout Burnes’ six-inning outing as he failed to have a single clean inning on the night, but gave up just one run on a solo shot to Vientos in the home half of the third to give the Mets a 1-0 lead they held for most of the game.
After scoring just three runs in last night’s disastrous series opener, the Arizona offense was once again moribund for much of the match. They had just four total baserunners through the first six-plus innings and had just two at-bats with a runner in scoring position over that period – a swinging bunt groundout by Corbin Carroll in the third and a harmless flyout by Lourdes Gurriel Jr in the fourth. But that all changed in the seventh with a two-out rally after opener Huascar Brazoban and Brandon Waddell yielded to Ryne Stanek. Gurriel poked a single up the middle before Jorge Barrosa sacrificed his bat for a double down the line to put two runners into scoring position. Torey Lovullo, sensing an opportunity, elected to pinch hit Geraldo Perdomo on a scheduled night off for Garrett Hampson who promptly dunked a two-RBI single into left for a 2-1 D-Backs’ lead. That score would hold until things got wild and wooly (as my mother would say) in the ninth as Moreno worked a leadoff walk ahead of Gurriel’s double to left to once again put two runners into scoring position. There was no clutch hit this time around, but there was good situational hitting as the D-Backs added a pair of runs on consecutive sacrifice flies from Barrosa and Perdomo to push the lead to 4-1 – runs they would ultimately need.
After the D-Backs put together a rally in their half of the inning, the Mets followed suit – mostly off the back of a disturbingly wild Justin Martinez. I understand the youngster continues to insist that he feels fine and that his arm is not experiencing any of the “fatigue” he had beforehand, but that’s hard to square with the reality of the situation. For the second straight appearance, Martinez looked erratic, giving up a leadoff solo homer to Tyrone Taylor that cut the lead in half 4-2 and allowing a pair of walks without recording an out before Lovullo mercifully ended his night for Ryan Thompson. Of course, Thompson looked little better as he plunked Alonso in the hand after getting ahead of him with two strikes, and I was feeling resigned to writing up a disastrous ninth-inning collapse as the Mets had the bases loaded with no outs. But once again, New York failed to capitalize on the opportunity as Thompson struck out Vientos, induced a sacrifice groundout from Jesse Winker, and completed the miracle with a routine groundout from Francisco Alvarez.
But tonight continues a troubling theme for Burnes: he is walking hitters at a prodigious rate while failing to strikeout many batters. He was able to work through those issues tonight as he has through much of the season, but it was a tightrope that could just as easily ended very differently. The seven-year veteran was expected to be a co-ace alongside Zac Gallen, but so far this season, both have looked shaky even if the topline numbers look all right. Thankfully, the what-ifs and expected stats aren’t the ones that ultimately count, but the righty will need to clean up his performance if he hopes to regain the form that prompted the D-Backs to sign him to a record-setting deal over the offseason. We’ll just have to hope the rest of the team can clean up their play alongside him to keep the positive momentum from tonight rolling – especially with a rubber match set for tomorrow.
