Mets' Jose Butto blows late lead, Edwin Diaz gives up walk-off homer as club settles for series split vs. Padres
San Diego Padres' Jurickson Profar, second left, celebrates with David Peralta, left, after hitting a two-run home run during the eighth inning in a baseball game against the New York Mets, Sunday, Aug. 25, 2024, in San Diego. Credit: AP/Brandon Sloter
SAN DIEGO — Edwin Diaz dared to watch for just a second, but watching was all he could do. The damage was done. The game was over.
He turned his back to the action to walk toward the Mets’ dugout. Jackson Merrill, likewise, turned to the Padres’ dugout, his leaps down the first-base line punctuated by double fist pumps.
The Mets had been five outs from a series win over San Diego, one of the clubs they’re chasing in the National League wild-card race. Instead, they lost, 3-2, and had to settle for a four-game split.
Merrill hit a walk-off blast against Diaz with one out in the bottom of the ninth. An inning earlier, Jurickson Profar hit a tying two-run homer against Jose Butto.
This one stung.
“We were so close,” said Jose Quintana, who tossed 6 1⁄3 scoreless innings in a major rebound from his recent ineffectiveness. “We were so close. They are a really good team. We don’t expect to lose this game. We had some good opportunities. It’s a little frustrating at the end. But it was a close game. Sometimes that’s going to happen.”
J.D. Martinez said: “Today was a tough one. Needed that one.”
And manager Carlos Mendoza, whose team remained 2 1⁄2 games behind Atlanta for a playoff spot: “A tough one, no doubt about it. But we just gotta turn the page.”
The Mets carried a 2-0 lead — via solo home runs by Martinez and Mark Vientos — into the bottom of the seventh, which is when the game and Mendoza’s bullpen management got interesting.
First, Mendoza left Quintana in to begin the frame. His reasoning: After Manny Machado, who was leading off, San Diego (74-59) had two lefthanded batters due up. Without a lefty reliever available, he preferred to have Quintana face them instead of bringing in the righthanded Butto.
Butto came in a few batters later, and the Mets escaped a two-on, one-out jam after Merrill was caught stealing second.
Sticking around for the eighth, Butto got ahead of No. 9 hitter Mason McCoy 0-and-2 but wound up walking him. Mendoza called that “pretty much the at-bat that cost him the game.”
“That’s a hitter you have to attack,” Butto said through an interpreter. “When you walk him, you end up paying for it, especially when you have to face the top of the order.”
The next batter, Profar, lined a sinker into the rightfield seats.
Diaz had been warming up, but Mendoza opted not to bring him in because “I wasn’t going to go five outs with Diaz. I wasn’t going to push him.”
What’s the difference between four outs and five outs?
It’s “the same,” in Diaz’s words.
“There’s a lot that goes into it,” Mendoza said. “I was pushing him by getting more than one inning. We just didn’t get there.”
Diaz left a slider over the plate to Merrill, a leading National League Rookie of the Year candidate, to end it. "I just missed my location,” he said.
An early missed opportunity for the Mets came when Francisco Lindor struck out with the bases loaded in the fourth inning against freshly inserted reliever Bryan Hoeing. The Mets went 0-for-3 with runners in scoring position and stranded eight.
Up next: A three-game set against the red-hot Diamondbacks (75-56), another wild-card team.
“A lot of crazy stuff happens in September,” Martinez said. “And we’re still in August.”
Tim Healey is the Mets beat writer for Newsday. Born on Long Island and raised in Connecticut, Tim has previously worked for the South Florida Sun Sentinel, the Boston Globe and MLB.com. He is also the author of “Hometown Hardball,” a book about minor league baseball in the northeast.
