NLDS Game 3: Mets 13, Dodgers 7 – Everything Is Terrible

The Mets crushed the Dodgers 13-7 to take a 2-1 series lead in the NLDS. Starter Brett Anderson and long-man Alex Wood both turned in disaster performances while the bats were basically silenced after the second inning sans a futile late rally.

The game, of course, was in New York, and after what transpired in Game 2 and yesterday, Chase Utley got the most predictable welcome ever.

Before the game, manager Terry Collins said that he told Mets starter Matt Harvey not to retaliate, and the Mets did not in fact do so against anybody, though Utley didn’t get in the game either.

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Harvey started the game off making quick work of the Dodgers with a 1-2-3 first inning, getting two ground outs and striking out one. Anderson replied with a 1-2-3 inning of his own, notching a strikeout of his own and somehow touching 95 mph on the radar gun.

But then the second inning started and so did the fireworks. The Dodgers started the top of the frame with four consecutive singles by Justin Turner, Andre Ethier, Carl Crawford, and Yasmani Grandal, the last of which drove in Turner and Ethier to give the Dodgers a 2-0 lead, and after a Curtis Granderson throwing error trying to get Crawford going to third, he also scored to put the Dodgers up 3-0.

Unfortunately, the Dodgers gave it right back and more in the bottom of the inning. Four consecutive infield singles by the Mets netted them a run, cutting the lead to 3-1, but two of those singles consisted of a grounder to Jimmy Rollins that he lollygagged on and a soft bounder that Howie Kendrick couldn’t glove. That ended up mattering, as Granderson cleared the bases with a two-out double to give the Mets a 4-3 lead, and they didn’t look back from there.

The Mets piled on nine more runs on the Dodgers after the second inning. Anderson gave up six runs in three innings on seven hits and Wood followed with four runs in two innings on four hits and a walk. The bullpen was actually, uh, quietly decent again besides one Pedro Baez. Yimi Garcia, J.P. Howell, and Luis Avilan threw three shutout innings allowing only a walk and a hit. Unfortunately, Baez did pitch, allowing a hit and two walks for three runs (two earned) without recording an out.

The Dodgers other runs came on a seventh inning solo shot by A-Gon, that cut the game to a air-tight 10-4, and Kendrick’s three-run shot in the ninth that trimmed the lead to 13-7. Well, at least it got the Mets closer in the game?

Bleh.

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I think it’s fair to ask a few questions of this game, namely:

1) Why start Enrique Hernandez over Joc Pederson in center given the platoon splits?

2) Why start Rollins over Corey Seager at short despite whatever perceived (important word) defensive gap?

3) Why bring in Wood, on like two weeks rest, into a role he hasn’t fulfilled regularly in two years?

But whatever, again, the Dodgers fate won’t be decided by Game 3 or the third starter, it’ll again come down to Clayton Kershaw and Zack Greinke being on tap for four starts in a five-game series and being able to win three of those games. Same as it always has.