SAN DIEGO — the game changer for the Mets of their four-3 loss to the Padres on Thursday night was a deep fly ball off the bat of Fernando Tatis Jr.
The Padres’ celeb shortstop scorched a fastball from Taijuan Walker 401 ft to straightaway middle at Petco Park. The ball sailed and found its manner into Mason William’s glove, who had tracked it flawlessly to the bottom of the center-area wall. though it regarded like Williams become about to smash Tatis’ evening, the play wound up being a heartbreaker for the Mets.
The ball went in and out of the outfielder’s glove because the back of his hand smacked off the top of the wall. The nearly-trap led to a two-run home run for Tatis. The Padres took the lead for a -run distinction that could haunt the Mets for the rest of the sport.
“I informed [Walker] that become possibly the closing time so one can ever take place,” Williams said of his awesome trap attempt. “I don’t recognize how it got here out of the glove at the time.”
San Diego tacked two greater runs off Walker before the Mets even got at the board against Yu Darvish, who became dealing from the mound and generating on the plate. Tatis took a volatile sprint from 1/3 to domestic on a wild pitch from Walker within the 5th inning. The ball bounced not too far faraway from the plate, however Tatis’ slide turned into known as safe by the point Walker included home and failed to tag him out.
“There’s maybe a handful of men who would take that risk, and less that would be secure,” Walker said.
Tatis’ aggressive baserunning, too, wound up costing the Mets. but Walker, who delivered an outstanding 1.eighty four technology into his tenth start of the 12 months on Thursday, seemed in contrast to himself.
The right-hander gave up four runs (three earned) on seven hits and struck out two throughout 5 innings. Walker’s loose passes hurt him as he walked 4 Padres throughout a season-excessive 104 pitches. The Mets bullpen, as has been the case at some point of this early part of the season, remained dominant and hurled three scoreless innings after Walker’s rocky begin.
“actually wasn’t my best stuff today,” Walker said. “had to grind via it today. i was form of all over the location.”
James McCann persevered his red-warm stretch at the plate together with his second domestic run in as many days. His -run bullet to left field became his seventh RBI inside the final three games and taken the Mets inside two runs of the Padres. Billy McKinney and his speed logged an RBI triple to attract the Amazin’s even nearer, with a one-run deficit, inside the eighth.
McKinney’s triple bounced off the wall within the right-field nook, deep sufficient that he had a threat to show into an interior-the-park-homer that could’ve tied the game. however 1/3-base coach Gary DiSarcina placed up a forestall sign to kill McKinney’s momentum and hold him at 1/3. the subsequent batter, Brandon Drury, grounded out to quit the inning, making DiSarcina’s stop signal even extra questionable.
“We usually need to be competitive,” manager Luis Rojas stated of DiSarcina’s decision. “coaching 0.33 base is difficult. It’s a tough task. you have to anticipate, you need to see the play unfold. For me, it might’ve been absolutely close. a whole lot of times you want to take a danger because they still got to make a really perfect throw to home and make a tag. but I’m going to stick to my 1/3-base train’s selection.”