Guillorme sent down to bring up pitching help
NEW YORK — The Mets were forced to option a valuable bat in the form of Luis Guillorme on Friday, as two short starts by Seth Lugo and Jacob deGrom left the bullpen shorthanded headed into their game with the Braves.
In Guillorme’s stead, the team called up righty Franklyn Kilome from the alternate site. Guillorme cannot return to the Mets this season unless a player goes on the injured list. He was slashing .347/.431/.429 but played in only 26 games with 49 at-bats because of the team’s crowded infield.
The Mets, though, were in dire straits, having used nine relief pitchers for 14 ⅓ innings in two days and going into Friday with Steven Matz making his return to the mound after 19 days on the injured list.
Conforto’s future: Mets general manager Brodie Van Wagenen said that he considers Michael Conforto “as a longterm piece of our core” and added that they’ve had preliminary conversations about a contract extension in the past.
Conforto came into Friday hitting .341 with nine homers and 31 RBI. He’s signed to a one-year, $8 million salary, and is making a prorated $2.9 million.
“We’ll see howthose conversations go when we start to put in this entire piece to the puzzle trying to develop a roster strategy as wegointo the offseason,” Van Wagenen said.
Extra bases: Mets manager Luis Rojas said Dellin Betances (right lat tightness) has made progress at the alternate site and is “doing great.”
“He faced hitters yesterday. He’s throwing the ball really good. Everything is progressing accordingly,” Rojas said. “We’ll just see how he feels after having some competition and some ramp-up activity. ... (If he feels good) then we can definitely talk about the next step with him.” ... Rojas didn’t have an update on deGrom (hamstring) because of the team’s late arrival to the ballpark.