On a night when trade rumors swirled throughout Citi Field and Bartolo Colon’s pitches were straighter than a sober judge, Lucas Duda again showed why the Mets have so patiently awaited his offensive eruption.
“It’s just one of those days. Sometimes you have good days and bad days,” Duda said. “This happened to be a good day.”
Actually, Duda on Wednesday enjoyed what would be a good month for some as he continued his recent home-run barrage with three solo shots — giving him six homers in four games. So Duda supplied one of the few, if not only, areas of encouragement in the Mets’ 7-3 loss to the Padres on an utterly bizarre night.
“It was a weird kind of a deal, I guess,” Duda said of the night where rumors of a deal to send Wilmer Flores and Zack Wheeler to Milwaukee for Carlos Gomez circulated, causing Flores to break down and cry as the crowd of 24,804 showed enthusiastic support for him.
One element perhaps worthy of tears — besides the Mets dropping two games behind winning Washington in the NL East — was Colon’s effort, his shortest outing in more than three years. Colon, with elevated straight pitches, lasted just 2 ¹/₃ innings, surrendering six runs on 10 hits.
“I was missing my location and the ball wasn’t moving like it normally does. And everything was up in the zone and they were able to take advantage,” Colon (9-10) said through an interpreter. “I tried to make an adjustment but when you fall behind in the count and everything is up in the zone and you’ve got no movement, there’s nothing you can do.”
So the Mets fell behind too far, too quickly. Other than Duda, the offense consisted of two singles, one of the infield variety by Flores in the second, the other a pinch-hit job in the eighth by Eric Campbell.
“We get a couple guys on tonight and all of a sudden we’re right in the game with the way he’s swinging the bat,” manager Terry Collins said of Duda, who became the 11th Met ever with three homers in a game as he drilled Nos. 16, 17 and 18 on the season.
Duda connected off starter and winner Tyson Ross (7-8) leading off the second. He victimized reliever Kevin Quackenbush in the sixth and then roughed up reliever Marcus Mateo leading off the ninth. None was cheap.
“I’ve been seeing the ball much better than I have in the past,” said Duda who had his fourth multi-homer game this season, 10th of his career while joining Kirk Nieuwenhuis as the only Mets this season with three homers in a game — and the only Mets ever to do it at home.
Duda began his recent punishment of outfield seats with two solo homers against the Dodgers Friday, a two-run shot against the Padres Tuesday and then his trio grand Wednesday. And they were good for his psyche, too, after horrid June-July struggles.
“I was frustrated. I wasn’t really doing what I was capable of,” said Duda. “Certainly, I was feeling that I hurt the team more than help the team. So that was tough for me. But I feel I’m starting to get my swing back and digging myself out of this thing. I take it personal. This is what I love to do. This is my job, even though I don’t consider it a job. It’s nice just to contribute. From here on out, it’s about winning. It’s not about personal stats, accolades or whatever.”
Colon, who has a 6.16 ERA in his last seven starts, gave up two runs in each of the first three innings. Matt Kemp singled in a run in the first when Justin Upton also had a sac fly. In the second, Will Venable and Yangervis Solarte had RBI singles. Colon got raked in the third when Upton (who added an RBI hit in the sixth) bashed his 17th homer before Yonder Alonso drove his fourth.
And all Mets not named Duda went meekly.
“I still think at the end of the year he’s going to put up very good numbers,” Collins said. “Are they going to be 30 homers? I hope so because that means he’s going to have a tremendous couple months.”
Well, Duda has started with a tremendous couple games.