NEW YORK — Home field advantage typically refers to bigger locker rooms, shorter commutes and friendly fans, but facing the San Diego Padres on Monday night at Citi Field, the Mets received an advantage in the form of some dirt and paint.
Two rollers in the same inning made for a couple of entertaining moments. Tens of thousands of fans watched intently to see if a bunt up the third-base side by Luis Guillorme would roll foul and a slow roller off the bat of Tomas Nido just two batters later would do the same. They both stayed fair and the Mets capitalized by scoring three runs in the seventh inning to defeat the Padres, 5-0.
With the Mets up 3-0 in the seventh, Yu Darvish came back out for his seventh inning of work and promptly gave up a leadoff double to Mark Canha. Guillorme attempted a sacrifice bunt, which is where the entertainment began.
Guillorme’s bunt rolled slowly up the left side of the infield, right along the narrow strip of dirt between the baseline and the grass. Darvish, along with third baseman Manny Machado and the umpires followed the ball’s path expecting it to roll foul. But it came to rest right on the line, staying fair for a single for Guillorme and giving Canha more than enough time to get to third base.
Eduardo Escobar hit one right into the left fielder’s glove but it was deep enough for Canha to score, putting the Mets (6-5) up 3-0.
Nido chopped one to the left and, once again, the ball traced the same path with the same crew following. The umpire signaled fair. The fans erupted. The Mets dugout exploded with laughter. It was pure comedy for everyone except the Padres (6-5), who then replaced Darvish with lefty Tim Hill.
Hill got Nimmo to ground into a force out, but that still left runners on the corners. Francisco Lindor doubled to score them both.
Darvish (0-1) was charged with five runs on six hits over 6 1/3 innings, walking one and striking out five.
Max Scherzer (2-1) went hitless through the first 4 1/3 innings, surrendering a single to Ha-Seong Kim in the fifth. But he pitched around Kim to get out of the inning relatively easily. Three walks prevented Scherzer from going deep into the game, but he still earned the win with five shutout innings, allowing one hit in five innings of work and striking out six.
Scherzer was struggling with his pitch count, using 64 bullets through three innings while Darvish was cruising. But the Mets picked Scherzer up in a big way in the bottom of the third, giving him two very important runs to work with.
Darvish was nearly out of the inning with two out and none on, but Brandon Nimmo singled up the middle and stole second base. Then Darvish beaned Lindor to put two on with two out.
Darvish threw Jeff McNeil a sweeper. It was the wrong pitch to throw the 2022 NL batting champ. McNeil flared it into right field and it rolled to the corner. Nimmo scored and Lindor hustled all the way around from first base, reaching home safely with an especially smooth slide.
The Mets used right-handers John Curtiss, Drew Smith, David Robertson and Adam Ottavino to close out and get back into the win column.
