The Mets lost, the Giants won, the Diamondbacks lost, and the Reds won.
The scope has narrowed on the season, and with 10 games left, that’s all anyone absolutely needs to know about the state of the National League Wild Card race Wednesday night.
So, yes, while it kind of matters that Juan Soto came two inches shy of tying the game and that David Peterson struggled again, now is the time for cold, stark scoreboard watching. And that means that the Mets’ 7-4 loss to the Padres is just another entry in the log that threatens to sink their season.
“We’ve just got to be consistent,” said Soto, who tied a career high with his 41st homer in the fifth. “We’re still in but we’re still in a good spot. We’ve got to get going today. You cannot wait for tomorrow. Tomorrow’s going to be too late.”
Trailing by three in the seventh, Francisco Alvarez, battling a torn UCL in his thumb, a broken pinkie, and in the lineup despite being nailed in the triceps with a 99.8-mph sinker Tuesday, hit a solo homer off the top of the wall in right-center to draw the Mets to within 6-4. Jeremiah Estrada then walked Cedric Mullins before getting Francisco Lindor to pop out to shortstop for the first out.
The Padres then went to flamethrowing Mason Miller to face Soto, who hammered a 102.6-mph fastball deep to left — a ball that veered about two inches foul of tying the game. He and Pete Alonso then both struck out to end the threat.
“His fastballs is one of the best I’ve ever faced,” Soto said. “I knew [the long foul ball] had enough power to go out. I just didn’t know how long it was going to stay fair.”
Ramon Laureano hit a solo homer off Ryne Stanek in the ninth to give the Padres some more breathing room.
The Mets put up some fight in the ninth: With two on and two out against Robert Suarez, Soto came up as the tying run but hit a line drive that Suarez caught to end it.
The Diamondbacks, who hold a tiebreaker over the Mets, are just 1 1⁄2 games behind them for the final postseason spot. The Reds, who also hold a tiebreak, are two games behind, as are the Giants, whom the Mets bested in the season series, 4-2. (The Mets tied the Diamondbacks in the season series, but Arizona owns the next tiebreak, which is intra-division record.)
The Diamondbacks do have the hardest remaining strength of schedule in the majors, with games against the Phillies, Dodgers and Padres. But the Mets also have to hope for far fewer games like Wednesday’s, where they showed spark but wilted when it mattered.
Peterson, who has a 7.59 ERA over his last eight starts, was again victimized by soft contact, an elevated sinker, and, in a major-league career first, a grand slam, courtesy of Manny Machado in the fifth. He allowed six runs and six hits with three walks and one strikeout over five innings in a game the Mets never led. The lefty will make his next start, manager Carlos Mendoza said.
“It’s obviously tough when you know what you’re capable of,” said Peterson, whose first half earned him an All-Star nod. “You can’t hold onto it. [You] look at it as objectively as possible, correct the things that need to be worked on and move forward.”
The Padres created traffic off Peterson in the first, capped by Gavin Sheets’ sacrifice fly to center, scoring the game’s opening run. The Mets tied it on Alonso’s homer off Nick Pivetta in the bottom of the inning, his 36th homer of the year and team-leading 119th RBI.
But some soft contact off Peterson in the second allowed the Padres to go ahead again. Jackson Merrill blooped a single in front of Mullins in center, moved to second on Jose Iglesias’ ground out, and then came home on Jake Cronenworth’s bloop to center. The hardest ball hit in the inning was Elias Diaz’s 84.7-mph inning-ending double play.
Starling Marte homered in the fourth to tie it at 2 before the Padres tagged Peterson for four runs in the fifth. Peterson loaded the bases on a hit batsman, a walk and Luis Arraez’s bunt single before Machado launched a full-count, knee-high curveball into the first few rows in left-center for his 14th career grand slam, giving the Padres the 6-2 advantage.
Soto brought the Mets to within three in the bottom of the fifth, when he teed off on Pivetta’s hanging curveball.
Dom Hamel, making his major-league debut in the sixth, nearly gave that one back: He hit Diaz, and let up back-to-back singles to Fernando Tatis Jr. and Arraez. Soto, though, was able to throw out Arraez trying to stretch the hit to second before Diaz could score, keeping it a three-run deficit until Alvarez’s homer in the seventh.
“We’ve got to win baseball games,” Mendoza said. “We’ve got 10 to and we’ve got to win as much as possible.”
It’s the cold, stark reality, and it’s the only thing that matters anymore.
Laura Albanese is a reporter, feature writer and columnist covering local professional sports teams; she began at Newsday in 2007 as an intern.
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