[Westheim]

Mets (6-6) vs. Padres (3-9) – April 12, 2023

Rubber game time – the Mets were an arm short in the pen with the injury to Lucchesi, which had yet to be sorted out with more scans at New York Presbyterian’s, while the Padres brought up right-hander Wilmer Font, who had yet to get hit with his 0.82 ERA, a stark departure from his 5.49 career ERA, and the 9.92 mark he posted the last year he pitched in the majors, which was all the way back in the ‘rona season in 2020 with the Blue Jays.

SD: SS Bogaerts – 2B Cronenworth – 3B M. Machado – 1B M. Carpenter – RF Dixon – DH N. Cruz – LF Ravelo – CF Grisham – C Campusano || P Font
NYM: CF Nimmo – 2B McNeil – SS Lindor – 1B Alonso – RF Marte – DH Vogelbach – LF Canha – 3B Guillorme – C Narvaez || P Carrasco

Rain was looming, so it probably wasn’t a bad idea to lead after five innings, but Carrasco got whacked right out of the gate. The Padres took a 2-0 lead on Cronenworth and Carpenter doubles into the right-center gap, then Brandon Dixon’s RBI single. Nelson Cruz also singled before Rangel Ravelo’s grounder to third base ended the dismal inning. The Mets in response loaded the bases with nobody out in the bottom 1st. Nimmo and Lindor hit singles to center, framing McNeil squirreling away ball four. That brought up Big Pete, who had finally broken the RBI ice the day before, but had yet to whack a homer this year. He lined out to short… Marte’s comebacker had Nimmo forced out at home plate, and Vogelbach went down on strikes. Three on, three stranded.

The rain arrived by the third inning, with the score still 2-0 Padres, and led to an hour-long rain delay by the time Nimmo drew a leadoff walk in the bottom 3rd. When play resumed, Nimmo advanced on two outs and scored on Big Pete’s soft single to center, 2-1. Marte tied up the game by doubling over the head of Grisham, who got out of shape bouncing off the fence and took his sweet time to get the ball back in, allowing Pete to score from first base on the double. Vogelbach singled to left-center, scoring Marte for a 3-2 Mets lead, but Marte also hurt himself on a rough slide around Luis Campusano, just as the backstop received the ball. Canha grounded out, ending the inning, then moved to rightfield, while Tommy Pham replaced Marte in left.

The Mets tried to get Carrasco through five, but it was apparent in the fourth inning that while he hadn’t been great before the long rain delay, he was completely dull now, although somehow the Padres managed to go down in order in the inning. We’d be in the pen by the fifth, and the Padres were so even by the fourth, having Nabil Crismatt give up three singles to Nimmo, McNeil, and Lindor, and a run along with it. Stephen Nogosek pitched the fifth and sixth, giving up only a walk to Manny Machado, who didn’t get off first base. Nimmo made a sliding catch in center to help out Nogosek, then hit a homer off Crismatt to tack on a run in the bottom 6th, making it a 5-2 game.

Adam Ottavino had more trouble in the seventh, putting all the tying runs on base with two singles and by nicking Cronenworth with two outs, but got Machado to fly out to Canha to end the inning without giving up any runs. Brandon Dixon hit a single off Brooks Raley in the eighth, but otherwise struck out two Padres on the way out of the inning and bridging the game to Robertson, who entered with a 3-run lead after the Mets put Canha and Narvaez on base in the bottom 8th, but Guillorme had hit into a double play before, and Nimmo struck after Narvaez’ single. Robertson was in trouble immediately with a leadoff walk to Grisham, which gave everybody ugly flashbacks to his 4-walk blown save a week ago in Milwaukee. Campusano whiffed, but Bogaerts singled to left. Cronenworth grounded out, advancing the runners to scoring position and bringing up Machado, who hit a fly to center, but there was Nimmo – and Nimmo had it. 5-2 Mets! Nimmo 3-4, BB, HR, RBI; McNeil 2-3, BB; Lindor 2-4, RBI; Nogosek 2.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 3 K, W (1-0);

In other news

Orioles 1B Lewin Diaz (.189, 3 HR, 8 RBI) collects three hits, two homers, and seven RBI in an 8-4 win over the Athletics.

TOR LF/CF/C Daulton Varsho (.298, 4 HR, 9 RBI) socks two homers in a 6-5 win over the Tigers, including a walkoff home run in the ninth inning.

The Phillies try to break out of their early-season funk with four homers in a 14-0 crushing of the Marlins.

Complaints and stuff

Starling Marte will be day-to-day with back spasms, which might hamper him the rest of the week, right, Dr. Vitrolescu? – Yes, surely. – Wait, why would you drain him of his blood?

I don’t think we quite wanna go there yet, Dr. Vitrolescu.

The Barves swept their double-header with the Reds, 3-1 and 6-1, and so extended their lead in the division to three full games. The Gnats lost to the Angels, 6-2.

And so we’re off to the West Coast. We won’t be back for a week and a half, and we’ll play a total of ten games in Oakland, L.A., and San Francisco. Tomorrow will be off, as will be the Monday after the road trip ends, which lessens the travel burdens at least. Due to the silly new schedule, the Mets would travel beyond St. Louis five separate times this year, twice for a single series in Colorado and Houston, respectively. The remaining NL West teams would be done away with in a combined Snakes/Padres trip in the final week before the All Star Game. The fifth trip involved the Royals, which were technically also west of St. Louis.

Bright sides: at least the chance for snowouts during our trips to Colorado (late May) and Minnesota (early September) was no greater than 25%.