Trevor Williams gave up 3 ER in 4 IP and Chasen Shreve allowed 4 ER in 1 IP putting the Mets in a hole from which they could not dig out, as they dropped the first game of the series to the Astros, 7-2, in Houston Tuesday night.
Williams allowed two homers in the third inning, one a cheapie to Jose Altuve to LF and one hit better to RF by Yordan Alvarez. Williams came out and threw a scoreless fourth but Buck Showalter was eager to go to his bullpen, depleted as it was. And that proved to be a mistake.
Shreve faced three lefties in the inning and they combined for a walk, single and a three-run double. Shreve now has a 5.61 ERA and the Mets have to seriously consider moving on from him.
Both runs by the Mets came via the home run. Pete Alonso crushed one to left field while Eduardo Escobar golfed one out to right. Too bad Escobar’s homer came in the seventh inning with nobody on. In his previous trip to the plate, the bases were loaded with one out and he struck out
Some random stats to close out this loss. Williams now has a 4.88 ERA on the road, compared to a 2.30 ERA at home. And J.D. Davis is now 3-19 with 10 Ks since June 15.
I’m pretty much out of patience with Escobar. As Brian mentioned he hit a HR when the game was out of reach after striking out with the bases loaded when he could have gotten the team back in the game. I honestly did not expect him to come through in that situation and he’s pretty much the only one on the team right now that I get that feeling from. Other than a cycle he hasn’t done much offensively this year and he hasn’t been good defensively either. I really hope he gets going but when McNeil is back Guillorme should be getting most of the starts at 3rd right now.
Gut Reaction: it was an untypical game for the Mets in that two players struck out with the bases loaded. We have come to expect contact in those situations even if it’s a sacrifice fly.
Davis is it concern, especially the strikeouts. Smith and Davis are not contributing at the DH position. If things don’t change soon the Met we’ll have to trade for another bat.
Escobar was expected to have slightly better offensive season in the range to 108 – 112 OPS+. He was always slightly below average as a defensive third baseman. Guillorme should get more playing time at 3B but not replace Escobar.
Shreve is hanging on a thread. In 23 appearances he has given up an earned run in 9 of them. It is a 61% Reliever Reliability Rate , which isn’t very good.
Let’s bounce back for the split. Let’s go Mets!