DENVER — The fat hits the Mets so desperately wanted in the thin air finally arrived Saturday night, but there still was the matter of trying to silence the dangerous Rockies.
In a Coors Field classic — or maybe the opposite of that description — pinch hitter Charlie Culberson smashed a two-run, game-ending homer off Kyle Farnsworth in the ninth to bury the Mets 11-10 in front of 38,688.
Troy Tulowitzki singled leading off the ninth, and with one out, Culberson cleared the center-field fence, sending the Mets to a third straight loss. The blown save was Farnsworth’s first in three chances as Mets closer.
“It was just a fastball up-and-away, and it came over the middle, I guess,” Farnsworth said. “He put a good swing on it.”
The Mets (15-14) were in position to win the game after Juan Lagares delivered a go-ahead RBI single against LaTroy Hawkins in the top of the inning. Bobby Abreu’s pinch-hit double had started the rally.
The Mets lost the early six-run cushion they bestowed to Jenrry Mejia, but recovered to twice tie the game before going ahead against Hawkins in the ninth.
The Mets’ offensive stars included Daniel Murphy, who finished 4-for-6, and David Wright, who reached base four times in a 3-for-5 game.
After the Rockies took a 9-8 lead in the seventh against Daisuke Matsuzaka, the Mets scrapped to tie the game an inning later on Chris Young’s RBI single. Murphy’s third hit of the game, a leadoff double, had put the tying run in scoring position.
After Mejia blew a six-run lead in the fifth and put his team in an 8-6 hole, the Mets rebounded with two runs the next inning to tie the game. Young slammed an RBI double before Curtis Granderson’s second hit of the game, a run-scoring single, made it 8-8. It gave Granderson consecutive multi-hit games for the first time this season.
Mejia’s night disintegrated in the fifth, when he surrendered two homers, including a grand slam to Nolan Arenado that gave the Rockies an 8-6 lead. Mejia had sailed into the inning working on a three-hit shutout before Ryan Wheeler homered leading off to inject life into the Rockies.
“I tried to throw the first pitch for a strike and they swung at it,” Mejia said. “But in the fifth inning they swung at it pretty good.”
Charlie Blackmon, Drew Stubbs and Carlos Gonzalez had three straight RBI singles against Mejia to slice the Mets’ lead to 6-4 before Arenado unloaded into the left-field seats for his second career grand slam. The blast extended his hitting streak to 23 games — the longest in the major leagues this season.
“Once in awhile they hit them where nobody is playing,” manager Terry Collins said. “[Mejia] made good pitches, had a double play that should have gotten him out of the inning. We dropped the ball and couldn’t get them out after that. It wasn’t Jenrry’s fault all the time, but the results are what they are.”
Mejia became the third straight Mets starting pitcher — after Bartolo Colon and Zack Wheeler — who failed to complete five innings. Overall, Mejia allowed eight runs on nine hits with two walks and three strikeouts over 4 ¹/₃ innings for a second straight flat performance after a sizzling start to the season.
“It was just a matter of a little bit of bad luck and then one or two pitches that got him,” catcher Anthony Recker said.
Arenado’s error on a Ruben Tejada grounder allowed Recker to score, capping a three-run third inning for the Mets. In the inning, Granderson stroked an RBI single and Recker delivered a run-scoring double. Wright singled leading off the inning and stole second.
Wright stroked an RBI double in the first to give the Mets a 1-0 lead. Recker and Lucas Duda delivered successive RBI singles later in the inning to give Mejia a three-run cushion before he threw his first pitch.