Walks sink Verlander as offense goes MIA

The Mets fell to the Dodgers 6-0, as the Mets’ bats fell completely silent against Julio Urías and the Dodgers bullpen and Justin Verlander walked a season-high six batters.

Verlander was doing pretty well matching zeros with Urías...until he wasn’t. With the game still scoreless in the fifth inning, Verlander had yet to allow a hit, but he had walked three batters. Still, despite a rising pitch count, Verlander was able to keep the Dodgers off the board mostly via timely strikeouts (he struck out six batters in total in the outing). But things unraveled very quickly for Verlander in the fifth. With the first batter of the inning retired on a nice sliding catch by Mark Canha in left field, Verlander walked the next three batters to load the bases.

Mookie Betts then hit a soft liner to left much like the one David Peralta hit to lead off the inning, but Canha was unable to reach this one, as it dropped in front of him for a base hit, driving in the game’s first run. Freddie Freeman then followed with the death knell—a two-run double that put the Dodgers up 3-0. Verlander retired the next two batters, but the damage had been done and with the way the Mets were (not) hitting, the game felt over at the halfway mark.

Urías gave up just one hit over his six innings of work—a leadoff double by Brandon Nimmo that was initially called a home run and then overturned on replay review—striking out seven batters and walking one. The Dodgers added a run off now-reliever David Peterson in the sixth and another run off Dominic Leone in the eighth in the form of a J.D. Martinez solo homer. In addition to the one walk issued by Peterson, Drew Smith walked two more batters in what was ultimately a scoreless ninth inning; the nine total walks issued by Mets pitching this evening were a season high. Yency Almonte and Caleb Ferguson each pitched a 1-2-3 inning for the Dodgers with a strikeout apiece and Ryan Brasier polished off an easy victory for the Dodgers in which the Mets’ bats looked listless to begin the second half.

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What’s WPA?

Big Mets winner: Brandon Nimmo, +2.3% WPA
Big Mets loser: Justin Verlander, -13.5% WPA
Mets pitchers: -18.0% WPA
Mets hitters: -32.0% WPA
Teh aw3s0mest play: Brandon Nimmo’s leadoff double in the first, +6.3% WPA
Teh sux0rest play: Freddie Freeman’s two-run double, -14.7% WPA