Surging offense, spotty pitching lead to 'bad combination' for Mets

NEW YORK -- The Mets and Cardinals found themselves in a slugfest on Sunday afternoon at Citi Field. When it was over, St. Louis had powered its way to an 8-7 victory over New York.

The score was tied at 7 in the top of the ninth inning with one out when Mets reliever Adam Ottavino watched old pal Nolan Arenado step up to the plate. Entering Sunday’s action, Arenado was 0-for-4 against his old Rockies teammate, but that changed in a hurry.

Ottavino was looking to throw the ball down on the outside part of the plate, but instead he threw the ball down the middle, and Arenado crushed it over the left-field wall to give St. Louis a one-run lead. It was Arenado’s second home run of the day.

“Sometimes, you get beat by a great player. It really stinks at the moment, [but] I’ll come back with confidence next time,” Ottavino said. “[Arenado] is a great player. I have respect for him. He is one of my close friends in the game. It’s a great battle every time. I look forward to it. Yesterday went my way. Today went his way. That’s going to happen sometimes.”

From the visitors’ clubhouse, Arenado called Ottavino a great friend and a tough matchup due to his arm angle and elite slider.

“You just have to pick and choose [pitches] with him,” Arenado said about Ottavino. “Me and [Paul Goldschmidt] were just talking about being aggressive and not letting [Ottavino] be too comfortable, because when you get two strikes, he has three or four different pitches and you’re in trouble. I just tried to stay tall and be OK with getting jammed.”

Early on, it looked like the Cardinals were going to have their way with the Mets. St. Louis had a 5-1 lead against right-hander Carlos Carrasco, including three runs in the second before an out was recorded. Arenado highlighted the scoring with a two-run homer in the first inning.

It was the second consecutive outing in which Carrasco couldn’t go past the fifth inning, and it came at a bad time for this team. The Mets needed their starter to go deep in the game, because they were short in the bullpen for the series finale. The club is playing a man down, with reliever Drew Smith suspended for 10 games after being ejected for using sticky substances against the Yankees this past Tuesday.

Fastball command has been an issue for Carrasco during this rough stretch. Asked how he can get the pitch back on track, he was optimistic.

“You continue working,” Carrasco said. “I will never give up. This is [a hard game]. I have to do something completely different to break that bad luck. Every fifth day, I do everything I can.”

His offense also did all it could to try to come away with a series victory.

After Francisco Lindor put New York on the board with a solo homer in the bottom of the first, the team made it a one-run game against left-hander Matthew Liberatore in the second. Brandon Nimmo had the biggest hit of the frame with a two-run double, though that turned into the final out as he tried to stretch it into a triple.

St. Louis answered with solo homers from Paul DeJong and Jordan Walker to reach a 7-5 lead in the fifth. But the Mets came back to tie the score when Tommy Pham clubbed a two-run homer off right-hander Chris Stratton.

Both offenses quieted down until the ninth inning, when Arenado hit the game-winning long ball.

Manager Buck Showalter said he appreciated the way the Mets battled back, though they were unable to come away with the win.

“You can tell by how much they put into getting back in the game and trying to cover some things that we [are not good at],” Showalter said. “We finally pushed through with Tommy, but couldn’t push that other [run] across. Obviously, we are short in the bullpen. Part of that was, we knew we had to score some runs today and we did.”

Looking for better pitching, the Mets have a tough three-game road series against the Astros, starting on Monday night.

“The days we score a lot of runs, most of those days right now we are giving up a lot of runs. It’s a bad combination,” Pham said. “It’s too hard to pinpoint one thing. We have a lot of guys over here who are great players. Unfortunately, we are looking at the middle of June and we still haven’t put it together.”