Angels let down by defense
Some sloppy early play hurts, and ninth-inning rally comes up short.
NEW YORK — A man resigned to his fate, New York Mets catcher Rene Rivera skittered to a stop at the cutout just past third base and stood tall, knees locked.
Luis Valbuena started the rundown half-heartedly by jogging toward Rivera. After a few strides, he shoveled the ball to teammate Jefry Marte. Too early. Like a prisoner who found his shackles unlocked, Rivera sensed new life. He sprung back toward third.
Shortstop Andrelton Simmons sprinted in, but the play was rushed. He couldn’t catch and apply the tag, and Rivera was safe at third.
It seemed an inconsequential play in the Angels’ 7-5 loss to the Mets on Saturday evening. The Mets were up three runs in the eighth inning.
But the extra out facilitated two extra runs. A late rally, when the Angels finally forced the Mets to offer Mike Trout hittable pitches, fell two runs short.
“That ended up costing us,” Simmons said.
Sloppiness defensively marked the effort. Cliff Pennington couldn’t field a ball cleanly in the fifth inning, leading to another unearned run. He also botched a throw on a double play in the first.
“That’s just a poor ballgame on the defensive end,” Manager Mike Scioscia said.
Defensive miscues were “the major reason we lost the game tonight,” he said.
After snoozing through eight innings, the Angels ignited in the top of the ninth. The first five batters of the inning reached base. When Trout stepped into the batter’s box with the bases loaded and no outs, he represented the go-ahead run.
The Mets had dreaded just this situation. With Albert Pujols out of the lineup with hamstring tightness, Trout had hardly seen hittable pitches.
Up three runs, with the bases loaded, with no outs, Mets manager Terry Collins considered a most unusual strategy.
“I’d almost try to walk this guy than pitch to him,” Collins thought. Did he come close? “Oh, absolutely,” Collins said.
Instead, Addison Reed pitched to him, and got him to fly to right, bringing in a run but making the first out.
Had the Angels’ defense been tighter, the pressure on Reed would’ve been amplified considerably. The mangled rundown and the missed plays in the field loomed large after the game. It is the second consecutive game this series that the Angels’ defense has sputtered.
Simmons said Pennington’s errors were forgivable.
“You can’t hang him for making a mistake,” Simmons said. “It happens.”
But the rundown, Simmons said, could’ve been resolved much more easily.
“You run him down,” he said. How? “By running him down,” he said. So instead of throwing... “Running him down,” he said.
The promise and peril with Angels’ starter Alex Meyer was again on display Saturday. His pitches could be fearsome. His fastball topped out at 100 mph. He struck out seven batters.
But he labored. He needed 86 pitches to retire 12 batters. He allowed four runs (three earned) over four-plus innings.
“Again, his stuff was terrific,” Scioscia said. “He just had trouble getting into that zone again.”
Meyer has bopped between the minor leagues and the majors. He hasn’t appeared in more than seven big league games in a single season. Saturday was his fifth of 2017.
“I felt like tonight I was close,” Meyer said.
But he said control issues limited his effectiveness.
In a shocking revelation, Meyer was effective with his bat.
Meyer hadn’t faced a live pitcher since he was in high school, in 2008. He is 6 feet 9, offering the one of the largest strike zones in major league history. Earlier this week, teammate Tyler Skaggs compared it to “like watching a giraffe hit.”
Before Saturday’s game, Scioscia said he was “not really curious” to see how Meyer could hit
Meyer’s legs almost spanned the length of the batter’s box when he dug in for his first at bat. Mets starter Zack Wheeler hadn’t yet given up a hit. Meyer hardly moved while watching two fastballs sizzle by.
“It was ... different,” Meyer said. “The first pitch, I wanted to see one. I don’t even think I got my foot down before it was in the catcher’s glove.”
The third pitch was an 87mph slider. He slapped it to right field: a legitimate single.
When he returned to the dugout, coach Alfredo Griffin held up the baseball, signaling that he’d keep it.
“I didn’t know they were serious,” Meyer said.
But after the game, it was waiting on a shelf in his locker, a souvenir from his first hit, if not a win.