Mets lose to Pirates to finish ugly road trip
Jeff McNeil of the Mets throws his bat after popping out to second base in the eighth inning against the Pirates at PNC Park on Sunday in Pittsburgh. Credit: Getty Images/Justin Berl
PITTSBURGH — At least they get to go home now.
The Mets concluded a horrendous road trip Sunday with a 2-1 loss to the Pirates, their Pete Alonso-less lineup unable to overcome a mediocre outing from Carlos Carrasco. They totaled three hits, just one after the fourth inning.
Heading into an off day Monday followed by games against the Yankees on Tuesday and Wednesday at Citi Field, the Mets are spiraling. They have lost eight of their past nine games and are 31-35 overall, 9 1⁄2 games behind first-place Atlanta in the NL East standings.
The Subway Series “definitely” could serve as a spark, Francisco Lindor said, because it is “one of the playoff atmospheres without being in the playoffs.”
Nothing else has worked lately.
“The concern has been there. It doesn’t start [Sunday]. It’s been there. However, we understand we got a job day in and day out, and that’s winning ballgames,” Lindor said. “Today we lost. Think about it, learn from it. Hopefully we can put on a great show for the fans at home.”
Alonso has a bruised and sprained left wrist and isn’t expected back until at least late June.
“Absolutely we miss him, but we still gotta get the job done,” Omar Narvaez said. “We don’t really rely on one hitter. We’re still a group and still a good team.”
A collectively bad day at the plate came with plenty of what- ifs. Narvaez twice made inning-ending outs with two runners on base. His spot was due up again in the ninth, but Starling Marte stepped out on deck as a would-be pinch hitter before the game ended.
Tommy Pham doubled with one out in the ninth, but Brett Baty and Mark Canha couldn’t advance him. Before Pham’s hit, Lindor struck out on a curveball outside that plate umpire Dan Merzel called strike three.
“They’re trying to do their best out there. He wasn’t trying to miss it,” Lindor said. “Whether the computer showed he missed it or not, it is what it is.”
With the Pirates (34-30) up by a run in the eighth, manager Buck Showalter inserted light-hitting Luis Guillorme for power threat Mark Vientos. Guillorme was “a better matchup on paper,” Showalter said, because of “the slider guy,” reliever Dauri Moreta, who has a wicked breaking ball. Guillorme struck out on a pitch-clock violation.
Righthander Mitch Keller — probably the Pirates’ top starter but coming off a three-start stretch in which he allowed 15 runs — yielded only Jeff McNeil’s homer in the fourth, one of two hits off him in seven innings.
Keller’s pitch count climbed into the 70s as early as the fourth, but he retired his final 10 batters.
“We knew he was going to be a challenge,” Showalter said. “You could see by his numbers coming in.”
Carrasco allowed two runs, six hits and three walks in 4 2⁄3 innings. He struck out only one and allowed at least one baserunner in every frame.
Showalter, seeking to keep Carrasco under 90 pitches because it was his first time pitching on regular rest this season, pulled him at 81 instead of letting him face Jack Suwinski for a third time.
Suwinski had a hard single and homered off the top of the rightfield foul pole in his first two at-bats.
“I went too short [Sunday],” Carrasco said.
Andrew McCutchen led off the bottom of the first with his 2,000th career hit, a single to leftfield. The PNC Park crowd — which had booed when Mets pitchers walked McCutchen, sitting on 1,999, earlier in the series — knew it right off the bat and gave him a standing ovation. McCutchen is fifth on the active hits leaderboard.
After the top of the second, the Pirates played on their video board congratulatory wishes from Pittsburgh sports icons Ben Roethlisberger and Sidney Crosby, plus former Pirate (and former Met) Neil Walker.
“He’s one of the hitters that I look up to and I have one of the most respect for. He’s been doing it for such a long time,” Lindor said. “It’s always special for a guy to have the character that he’s got, everything that he’s done. It’s cool. They obviously love him here.”
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.
