Mets show little fight as Luis Severino implodes in loss to Braves that trims NL wild-card lead
ATLANTA — This opening act with a National League wild-card berth at stake might have gotten the Mets booed off a Broadway stage, but at Truist Park was met mostly with glee.
Was it a lack of energy by the Mets on Tuesday or just dominant pitching by the home team? Maybe it was a combination of both.
“The way the game kind of unfolded there wasn’t a whole lot of energy to build on,” Brandon Nimmo said after the Mets lost 5-1 to the Braves.
This snooze-fest looked over by the middle innings, with manager Carlos Mendoza’s lineup incapable of providing as much as a buzz and the Mets erratic defensively behind an underwhelming Luis Severino.
Atlanta moved within one game of the Mets for the final wild-card berth, as Arizona — which began the day a half-length behind the Mets for the second spot — prepared to face San Francisco in a later game.
This much of the math still holds true: the Mets can wrap up a berth by winning this series. But with the weather threatening to become a factor over the next two days, it’s anybody’s guess if those games will be played before the Mets head to Milwaukee this weekend.
David Peterson is scheduled to face NL Cy Young award front-runner Chris Sale on Wednesday.
“Sale has been the best pitcher in the big leagues this year and so to get into the playoffs you have to beat the best,” Nimmo said. “We’ve had a lot of challenges in front of us this year we’ve been able to overcome and it’s just another one.”
On this night the Mets managed only four hits against Spencer Schwellenbach and the Braves bullpen and never seemed in the game once Atlanta broke through against Severino.
In his shortest start of the season, Severino slogged through four innings and allowed four earned runs on seven hits and one walk with five strikeouts.
It was the first time Severino allowed more than three earned runs in a start since Aug. 28 at Arizona.
“I made good pitches, but this is a good team,” Severino said. “They are going to fight, they are going to put on good at-bats and that is what they did.”
Orlando Arcia’s squib single leading off the third and Severino’s throwing error on the play started an inning in which the Braves established a 3-0 lead.
Michael Harris II’s RBI double brought in the first run before Ozzie Albies singled in another. Starling Marte threw home instead of hitting the cutoff on the play, allowing Albies to reach second. Severino recorded an out, but walked Marcell Ozuna and surrendered a two-out RBI single to Ramon Laureano.
“Definitely there was a lot of luck involved in that inning [by the Braves],” Severino said. “But I threw a lot of pitches there.”
Harris blasted a solo homer against Severino in the fourth that extended the Braves lead to 4-0. The homer was the fourth allowed by Severino in his last three starts.
“I thought [Severino’s] stuff was OK, but they made him work and got him,” Mendoza said.
Ozuna homered against Ryne Stanek in the fifth to bury the Mets in a 5-0 hole. Ozuna’s homer was his 39th of the season and gave him 102 RBIs.
The Mets had their best early shot against Schwellenbach in the third.
Jose Iglesias extended his hitting streak to 17 games with a two-out single and Nimmo reached on Arcia’s error before Marte was retired to end the threat.
Mark Vientos homered in the seventh to spoil Schwellenbach’s shutout bid. Vientos’ shot to right just cleared the right-field wall, slicing the deficit to 5-1. It was only the third hit for the Mets in the game.
The Mets got swept three games at Truist Park in the penultimate series of the 2022 season (with Jacob deGrom, Max Scherzer and Chris Bassitt as the starting pitchers), costing them the NL East, but Nimmo doesn’t want to hear about a potential carryover.
“There’s a lot of different people on this team,” Nimmo said. “We have a few that are the same, but … completely different people pitching. It’s just that they have a good team and they played well tonight.”
