Home Run Barrage Beats Mets

White Sox 6 Mets 4 (Rate Field, Chicago IL)

Mets record: 58-71

Mets streak: Lost 2

WP - Grant Taylor (5-2)

LP - Jefry Yan (1-1)

Seat on the Korner: Miguel Vargas

We select a Star of the Game and virtually invite him to take his Seat on the Korner — just as Ralph Kiner did on WOR-TV Channel 9 during the early days of the New York Mets.

Continuing the tradition of Rheingold Beer sponsoring Kiner’s Korner, this season every seat is proudly presented by The Main Event Restaurant & Sports Bar.

With locations in Plainview and Farmingdale, The Main Event features 80+ HD TVs, fresh daily seafood, and Black Angus certified steaks—so you never have to choose between great food and the big game.

On a night when home runs did the Mets in, we'll give the seat to White Sox third baseman Miguel Vargas, who started the onslaught with his home run in the sixth (see below). Vargas also had a double on the night, and in the field, managed to keep from blowing the game when he cut in front of shortstop Luisangel Acuna to catch a popup in the ninth. Vargas now has 29 home runs on the year, third best in the AL. All worth talking about with Ralph as they go over video from the game.

Need to Know

• The Mets are now 15-9 over their last 24 games.

• Luis Robert Jr., returning to Chicago, started in left field, and showed his unfamiliarity with the position in the first inning, badly playing a Miguel Vargas fly ball that A.J. Ewing ended up playing off the carom as Vargas chugged into second.

• On the other side, saying hello to their old Mets mates were Luisangel Acuna, who was part of the trade that brought Robert to the Mets, and Huascar Brazoban, sent to the Chisox at the trade deadline. After a difficult start, Acuna has turned it around, hitting .325/.341/.386 in his last 41 games, raising his average from .165 to .237. Brazoban, too, has had a difficult transition. He has allowed four runs on seven hits with two walks over his last four appearances -- a 5.63 ERA over eight innings, all told.

• It's Players Choice Weekend, and while the Mets wore their traditional road grays (boooooring), catcher Francisco Alvarez wore a chest protector and shin guards with the colors of his native Venezuela. With all the the yellow, it sort of made him look like a crouching crossing guard.

• Remember Disco Demolition Night? Or how about last week's Pope Hat Night? Unusual promotions are part of White Sox lore, so tonight's Elvis Presley Night seemed, well, tame....

• The Mets are now 23-24 since Andy Green took over for Carlos Mendoza.

• The series continues Saturday with Christian Scott scheduled to get the ball for the Mets, facing Luis Castillo.

  
  

Turning Point

Captain Obvious would take the easy road and call Jake Rogers' walkoff home run the turning point, but we'll be a little wonkier and assign the turning point to Francisco Alvarez' failure to challenge a ball three count on what looked to the WPIX announcing team and those of us scoring at home like strike three to leadoff batter Colson Montgomery. Mets' pitcher Jefry Yan thought so, and did his strikeout leap, only to realize it was premature. From there, the dominos began to tumble: a walk to Montgomery, a sacrifice to put pinch runner Braden Montgomery in scoring position, a ground out to send that Montgomery to third -- or, what would have been the third out had Alvarez used his challenge. That set up Yan facing Rogers, a .179 hitter who changed his sox from Red to White only last week. Having learned from the sixth inning barrage, Rogers lofted one to left center, taking advantage of the wind. Game over.

Three Keys

Gone With the Wind

Mets starter Sean Manaea played with fire through the first five innings, yielding multiple fly balls that, helped by a strong wind blowing in from right field, landed in A.J. Ewing and Carson Benge's gloves at the warning track in center and right fields. But in the sixth inning, it all caught up with Manaea as the White Sox hit the fly balls to left and took advantage of the wind. Let's start with Miguel Vargas, one of the Chisox' best power hitters:

Next up, Randal Grichuk:

And finally, Colson Montgomery, who hit one into the wind:

Back-to-back-to-back dingers, and a comfortable 4-0 lead had vanished. But if you were watching the game from the start, you knew it was just a matter of time.

The Bad Francisco Alvarez

How did Francisco Alvarez hurt the Mets in tonight's game? Let us count the ways: There was the aforementioned failure to use a challenge when it clearly was warranted. There was the groundout to end the second, when the Mets had plated two and had runners at the corners. There was the strikeout to end the fourth, with runners at second and third. And the wild swings to strike out in the seventh and the ninth. We've seen Alvarez get into these slumps with wild swings at pitches both high and low and outside, which is one reason we're not part of the Alvarez fan club. But when one of the broadcasters, in this case former pitcher Ron Darling, lets you know exactly what Alvarez is doing wrong (he's opened his stance), it tells you something, because we'll assume the Mets' hitting coaches have also mentioned this to Alvarez, and he hasn't listened.

When You See Your Opportunity, You Better Take It

Good teams, and teams trying to be good, need to take advantage of opportunities when they are handed to them. And the Mets -- who are in that trying to be good category -- were handed an opportunity in the top of the fourth when Luis Robert Jr. hit a ball that White Sox Gold Glove centerfielder Brenton Doyle lost in the lights, putting runners on second (Robert) and third (Jared Young) with one out. Up came Brett Baty, who had singled in the second. On the fourth pitch of the at-bar, Baty drilled a Sean Burke cutter down the right field line, scoring two to give the Mets a three-run lead. An opportunity presented, an opportunity cashed in.

Unfortunately, they didn't cash in on their opportunities later in the game.