Nolan Arenado drives in five, the Mets can only score four

The Mets lost the final game of the series, and the season, against the Rockies 6-4. Steven Matz started for the Mets and didn’t do much to help their cause, giving up five runs in the first two innings. All of those five runs were a result of one player, Nolan Arenado. In the first inning, Arenado hit a three-run home run following a double and a hit by pitch. In the second inning, with men on second and third base again, Arenado doubled to drive in two more runs.

Before, Arenado went ballistic on Matz, the Mets actually had a lead after their first time up. As the second batter of the game, Todd Frazier hit his eighth homer of the year to give the Mets an early 1-0 lead. Obviously, that lead wouldn’t last long in Coors Field, but it was a lead nonetheless. The Mets struck again the the third inning on Brandon Nimmo’s single which drove in Amed Rosario to bring the team within three.

After Matz’s rough first two innings, he settled down for the next three-plus innings, only allowing the Rockies to reach base three more times before the left the game. Unfortunately, the damage was already done as the Mets didn’t dig their way out of the early hole. Those three baserunners came in the form of a walk to Ian Desmond in the third and two singles in the fourth by DJ LaMahieu and Charlie Blackmon. Matz was able to get out of that jam by striking out Nolan Arenado and getting Trevor Story to ground out and keep the deficit at three runs. If nothing else, Matz went long enough to give the bullpen a bit of rest after two straight days of hard work. He finished the night with 5.2 innings pitched and gave up five runs. It may not be spectacular, but it was absolutely the best non-deGrom start at Coors for the Mets.

Following the Mets run in the top half of the third inning, the next four innings at Coors Field weren’t very Coors-like. The Mets and Rockies combined to score no runs during that stretch, mostly thanks to a few double plays that the Mets hit into. To be exact, the Mets hit into four double plays in that four inning stretch in addition to hitting into one after it, in the eighth inning. However it may have happened, Matz and Tim Peterson matched zeros with Kyle Freeland and Jeff Hoffman.

In the eighth inning, the Mets broke the scoreless stretch when Todd Frazier and Michael Conforto opened the inning with singles and Wilmer Flores brought Frazier home on a sacrifice fly. But, the Mets’ hopes of tacking on more were dashed as pinch-hitter Devin Mesoraco came in and quickly hit into the Mets’ fifth double play of the night to end the inning.

The Mets’ progress was undone in the bottom half of the inning in a similar fashion. Paul Sewald allowed Ian Desmond to reach base on a walk and Chris Iannetta singled to put men at first and third. Just like Flores had done before, Gerardo Parra hit a sacrifice fly off of Jerry Blevins to bring home Desmond and put the Rockies back up by three.

The Mets still had some fight in them in the the top half of the ninth and went down with a fight. Kevin Plawecki got things started with a triple to center field and set the Mets up nicely. Jose Reyes came up and brought Plawecki home on a grounder to second, but rendered the bases empty again. After an Amed Rosario fly out, left fielder Dominic Smith continued his impressive series with a double to left. Unfortunately, the National League leader in wRC+, Brandon Nimmo, stuck out representing the tying run.

The Mets finished up their season series against the Rockies with a 1-6 record across the games played at Citi Field and Coors Field. The odd thing about the record is that the teams actually scored the exact same amount of runs, 37.

The Mets return home tomorrow night to take on recently-activated Chase Utley and the Los Angeles Dodgers in the first of a six-game homestand. Zack Wheeler will take the mound for the Mets against the Dodgers’ Alex Wood at 7:10pm.

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What’s WPA?

Big winners: None
Big losers: Amed Rosario, -17.7% WPA, Steven Matz, -17.1% WPA, Wilmer Flores, -14.2% WPA
Teh aw3s0mest play: Michael Conforto’s eighth inning single, +9.6% WPA
Teh sux0rest play: Nolan Arenado’s first inning home run, -15.6% WPA
Total pitcher WPA: -17.1% WPA
Total batter WPA: -32.9% WPA
GWRBI!: Nolan Arenado