Zero down, 90 to go.
If the Mets are going to meet the “challenge” general manager Sandy Alderson has presented and win 90 games, they might want to figure out who exactly can be trusted from a bullpen that resembled a pigpen in the late stages of spring training and looked just as bad Monday.
Carlos Torres, Scott Rice, Bobby Parnell and John Lannan were all found guilty of arson, with Jeurys Familia as an accomplice, sending the Mets to a 9-7, 10-inning loss to the Nationals in front of an announced sellout of 42,442 on Opening Day at Citi Field.
Overall, Mets relievers walked four and surrendered five runs in the final 3 ¹/₃ innings.
“We ran into some of that in spring training and certainly it’s got to be addressed at this level,” said manager Terry Collins, who also watched his team fan 18 times against Stephen Strasburg and four relievers. “If you’re going to pitch here, you’ve got to be able to throw strikes. Use your pitches and try to get somebody to swing the bat.”
Before the game, Alderson reaffirmed the challenge he set to team personnel in a staff meeting early in spring training, saying 90 victories for the Mets in 2014 is a realistic goal.
And he’s not afraid of the criticism he might receive for making such a proclamation.
“It’s important for us to change the conversation,” Alderson said. “Being successful is not some nebulous concept about winning or being competitive or playing meaningful games some month. This is about concrete expectations.”
Torres and Rice combined to help flush a 4-3 lead in the seventh, throwing eight consecutive balls to walk in a run before the Mets went ahead an inning later on Juan Lagares’ homer. But Parnell wilted in the ninth, surrendering a run to tie, and the game got out of control in the 10th.
Familia allowed two soft hits in the 10th before Travis d’Arnaud was charged with a passed ball and Ian Desmond delivered a sacrifice fly for the lead. Lannan entered and walked Adam LaRoche, and Anthony Rendon’s ensuing three-run homer gave the Nationals a 9-5 lead.
The most troubling of the meltdowns for the Mets might have been Parnell’s given that his high-90s velocity still has not returned after his rehab from September surgery to repair a herniated disk in his neck. Parnell peaked at 94 mph Monday.
“Opening Day is the day you want to be at your peak and perform well, and it didn’t happen today,” Parnell said.
Andrew Brown’s three-run homer against Strasburg in the first gave the Mets a 3-0 lead before LaRoche hit a two-run blast the following inning for the Nationals. Still, the Mets led 4-3 in the seventh after Gee allowed an RBI single to Rendon with two outs. Torres then threw four straight balls to Nate McLouth to load the bases before the lefty Rice issued a four-pitch walk to Denard Span, tying the game at 4-4.
“I think I was prepared for the situation, I just didn’t execute my pitches,” Rice said. “In that situation, I can’t let that happen. If I got the job done, we would have had a bigger lead.”
Parnell was within a strike of ending the game in the ninth, going ahead 1-2 to Danny Espinosa, who fouled off three pitches in the process of working a walk. Span’s ensuing RBI double tied the game.
“The base on balls to Espinosa — I don’t know where that pitch was — that was the biggest at-bat,” Collins said.
David Wright hit a two-run homer in the 10th to close the gap, but to that point Lagares’ solo blast in the eighth against Tyler Clippard had accounted for the Mets’ only scoring after the second inning.
“It started out great,” Wright said. “Anytime you get to Stephen Strasburg, get four off of him, get him out after six innings, you have to capitalize on that.”