The New York Mets spent Saturday night treating a baseball like it was coated in motor oil, and the Los Angeles Dodgers were happy to accept the gifts.
A 4-3 Dodgers win at Citi Field turned on a third inning that belonged in a blooper reel, not a pennant race. Three Mets defensive miscues in the same frame plated two unearned runs — runs the Mets would spend the rest of the night chasing and never quite catching.
Kyle Tucker opened the scoring by clanking a solo home run off the right-field foul pole, his second long ball in as many days. Then the floor gave out beneath the Mets.
With one out and Dalton Rushing on first after a single, Shohei Ohtani hit a ground ball that should have been a double play. First baseman Brett Baty fielded it cleanly enough, but his throw to second grazed Rushing’s helmet and ricocheted into the outfield. Rushing advanced. The inning lived.
Andy Pages followed with another potential double-play grounder to Baty. This time the throw to second was completed, and Francisco Lindor fired back across the diamond to first. But pitcher Nolan McLean — the man responsible for covering the bag — couldn’t find it. The ball and the runner arrived at roughly the same time, and a run crossed the plate.
Two batters later, with Max Muncy at the plate, McLean threw an outside sweeper that catcher Francisco Alvarez simply booted behind the dish. The ball kicked out of his glove and skipped away. Pages scored standing up. 3-0, Dodgers, and the damage was entirely self-inflicted.
Yoshinobu Yamamoto made it hold up. He grinded through six innings of one-run ball, scattering five hits and three walks, stranding two runners three separate times. The Dodgers tacked on in the fifth when Pages and Bo Bichette traded RBI singles to push the lead to 4-1.
The Mets made it interesting late. In the eighth, Edgardo Henriquez plunked his first batter and walked the next before striking out two. Tanner Scott came in and surrendered a two-run double to pinch-hitter Tyrone Taylor, suddenly making it 4-3 and giving Queens a jolt of hope. Scott ended the threat by striking out AJ Ewing, and Brock Stewart locked down the ninth for his first save of the season.
The Dodgers improved to 67-38 and clinched their third consecutive series win coming out of the All-Star break, having taken series from the Yankees, Phillies, and Mets on this East Coast swing. They’ll go for the sweep Sunday with Emmet Sheehan (4-7, 5.13 ERA) scheduled to face right-hander Freddy Peralta (5-9, 5.01 ERA).
For the Mets, the box score will show a one-run loss. The film will show something uglier — three errors in one inning, two runs that never should have existed, and a comeback that ran out of runway because the foundation was already cracked.
Sources: