Mets end up on wrong end of a weird one in loss to Padres at Petco Park
Juan Soto of the Mets is held back by manager Carlos Mendoza after being called out on strikes by home plate umpire Emil Jimenez during the third inning at Petco Park on Tuesday in San Diego. Credit: Getty Images/Orlando Ramirez
SAN DIEGO — There was no full moon over Petco Park on Monday night. By all accounts, the Mets and Padres entered no parallel universe, and any reports of dogs walking on their hind legs have been fabricated.
No, this was simply a baseball game — a raucous, deeply bizarre, endlessly eventful baseball game that will go down as a 7-6 loss to the Padres.
With the Mets trailing by one and one out in the ninth, Ronny Mauricio, homering for his second time in as many days, tied the game at 6. But Gregory Soto let up a leadoff single to Xander Bogaerts in the bottom of the inning. Former Met Jose Iglesias laid down a sacrifice bunt but Soto, who would have gotten Bogaerts at second, threw wide of the bag so that both runners were safe.
Jake Cronenworth bunted, and this time Soto succeeded in getting the runner at third. Then, with two outs, Elias Diaz singled to left to score Iglesias, because of course it was Iglesias who scored.
That was the end of the OMG moments, but hardly the beginning.
The game also featured: a Carlos Mendoza ejection, an egregiously erratic strike zone, a robbed home run, Mark Vientos’ first career grand slam in the top of the fifth, and a five-run bottom of the fifth that erased a 5-1 Mets lead.
Juan Soto, the human strike zone, struck out three times, with MLB tracking system Gameday indicating that plate umpire Emil Jimenez called three strikes against him that were clearly out of the zone.
That’s not even all of it: Huascar Brazoban’s misplay helped key the big inning. Padres starter Dylan Cease was whacked in the head by a one-hopper and stayed in the game. He wasn’t even the only pitcher to eat grass Monday.
Got all of that? (Don’t worry, there’s a good chance the 43,596 in attendance didn’t get all of that, either). What matters is the result, and the Mets' season-high seven-game win streak came to an end and they are still 1 1/2 games ahead of the Phillies for tops in the NL East.
"Both teams battled," Vientos said. "We're talking about two playoff teams. I thought it was a great game and a pretty long game, too. We were going back and forth and they just came up on top today."
The Mets opened the scoring in the second when, with runners on the corners and one out, Brett Baty scored Jeff McNeil on a sacrifice fly to left.
In the third, Francisco Lindor’s 99.6-mph one-hopper nailed Cease in the back of the head, causing the pitcher to go down. Cease, who was momentarily disoriented, stayed in the game and struck out the final two batters in the inning.
In the bottom of the frame, Jimenez called a strike on Soto that appeared outside; Soto later struck out looking on a pitch that nicked the outside edge, and turned to exchange words with the umpire. Mendoza ran out to stand between his player and Jimenez, exchanged a few words of his own, and was ejected for the third time this season and the fifth time in his career.
Soto, who was subject to a bad called strike in the first inning, too, likely just skirted ejection himself; both Pete Alonso, in the on-deck circle, and first-base coach Antoan Richardson, running all the way from the coach’s box, guided him back toward the dugout before he could get rung up.
"He had a rough night,' Mendoza said of the umpire. "There’s no way to sugarcoat it there, especially when you're taking a couple at-bats away from Soto, some key at-bats. You’re talking about one of the best hitters in the game, and you're taking the bat away from him.”
When he saw Soto getting heated, Mendoza thought, "I got to be the one getting thrown out," he said. "I can't afford to [lose them], whether it's Soto or any of our players and I knew from the very beginning after a couple of calls early in the game that I needed to be on top of it . . . I've got to go out there and protect him."
Frankie Montas got into two-out trouble in the third, when he hit Manny Machado with a pitch and walked Jackson Merrill. This time, the Padres made him pay when Bogaerts singled to center and tied the game at 1.
Vientos nearly broke that tie in the fourth, but Fernando Tatis Jr. had other ideas. With McNeil on first, Vientos hit a ball over the wall in right, but Tatis brought it back, leaping to make the grab on the backhand. Vientos, though, got his do-over: Cease loaded the bases with two outs in the fifth to bring up the DH, who made abundantly sure that Tatis got nowhere near this one.
He rocketed a 94-mph fastball 385 feet to right for his first career grand slam to give the Mets a 5-1 lead.
The Mets gave back all those runs, with interest, in the bottom of the inning. Tatis’ hard-hit ball bounded off the tip of Baty’s glove for a double, and Luis Arraez homered off the foul pole in right to draw the Padres to within 5-3. Bogaerts then doubled to put runners in scoring position, ending Montas’ night in favor of Brazoban. Brazoban got the second out of the inning, but let up a shot to first that was stopped by a diving Alonso; Brazoban, though, failed to cover first for the run-scoring infield hit.
Montas allowed five runs, eight hits and two walks, with three strikeouts over 4 1/3 innings, further taxing a bullpen that had already pitched 11 innings in the previous three games.
Bryce Johnson’s single to right scored Bogaerts with the tying run and Diaz, who came into the day batting .195, hit a line single to left to put the Padres up 6-5.
Soto was once again rung up on a ball Gameday deemed high above the strike zone and, because Monday somehow needed both 1. Another pitcher to take a fall and 2. More adventures at first base, reliever Rico Garcia collided with Alonso while both covered first (Alonso rebounded quickly, and Garcia, after being checked by trainers, stayed in to pitch).
The game seemed ready to settle down after that. But no one was getting off that easy. Padres closer Robert Suarez was two outs away from a save when Mauricio hit a majestic, 415-foot homer to right to tie it.
Diaz’s hit in the bottom half allowed the game to end before crop circles appeared in the outfield.
Laura Albanese is a reporter, feature writer and columnist covering local professional sports teams; she began at Newsday in 2007 as an intern.
