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The Mets were defeated by the White Sox 6-4 Tuesday night, as little things and sloppy play piled up to spell doom for the Mets.
Things were going well in the beginning of the game as Steven Matz looked sharp and the Mets got on the board first. Todd Frazier made an error to allow Curtis Granderson to reach second. Granderson tagged up on both Michael Conforto and Yoenis Cespedes's fly balls and the Mets had a 1-0 lead.
Frazier helped out again with another throwing error in the second, but with the bases loaded and one out, they were only able to mange one run on a Granderson sacrifice fly to make it 2-0. They doubled that score in the third when Neil Walker hit his 13th home run of the year off starter Mat Latos. Those were the final runs for the Mets even though they continued to get runners on in the middle innings.
In the fourth, Conforto struck out with runners on first and second to end the inning, in the sixth it was Asdrubal Cabrera who struck out with runners on, and in the seventh Walker's two-out single went nowhere.
James Loney made his debut for the Mets and on top of going 0-for-4 at the plate, his defense hurt them as well. He made an error in the top of the second and butchered a ground ball in the sixth that was ruled a hit. That was crucial since the next batter, Todd Frazier, blasted a two-run home run cutting the lead to 4-2. Tyler Saladino walked and then easily stole second and third which led to the third run of the inning when Dioner Navarro singled him home. Matz's night was done and Jim Henderson was able to end the inning without further damage.
In the seventh, Noah Syndergaard came in to thunderous applause and did not disappoint. He was throwing 100 mph gas and successfully pitched around a Cabrera error when he got Frazier to strike out to end the inning.
Addison Reed was unavailable so Hansel Robles got handed the eighth inning responsibilities and ended up responsible for the loss. Robles's terrible, horrible, no good, very bad week got worse when he issued a lead-off walk to Melky Cabrera and he gave up a home run to Tyler Saladino two batters later. The White Sox would tack on another run off Logan Verrett later in the inning, but the damage had already been done since the Mets could not generate any offense in the final innings.
The Saladino home run is the glaring mistake, but poor defense, runners running at will on the bases, and men left on base all added to Tuesday's defeat.
SB Nation GameThreads
* Amazin' Avenue GameThread
* South Side Sox GameThread
Box scores
Win Probability Added
Source: FanGraphs
Big winners: None
Big losers: Hansel Robles -52.4%
Teh aw3s0mest play: Neil Walker home run in 3rd
Teh sux0rest play: Tyler Saladino home run in 8th
Total pitcher WPA: -52.1%
Total batter WPA: +2.1%
GWRBI!: Brett Lawrie