NEW YORK _ The Mets started Wilson Ramos behind the plate with Jacob deGrom on the mound on Friday night to give their offense a little more oomph against the Rockies. The Ramos-deGrom pairing was fine, but the Mets were six-hit by four Colorado pitchers in a 5-1 loss before 27,520 at Citi Field.
DeGrom (3-6) allowed two runs in six innings and left trailing 2-1.
The game got out of hand in more ways than one in the eighth. Drew Gagnon, after allowing long home runs to David Dahl (two-run shot) and Daniel Murphy to give the Rockies a 5-1 lead, hit Ian Desmond in the back with a pitch.
Desmond was not pleased and yelled at Gagnon. The benches and bullpens emptied and the players milled about on the third-base side of the mound before the scrum broke up. It flared up again on the first-base side before everyone went back to their corners. Murphy, the former Met, was the hottest Rockies player before he was escorted off the field by Dominic Smith.
Gagnon was not ejected, but he was booed fiercely by the hometown crowd when he was removed one batter later.
The numbers don't lie: deGrom went into the game with a 1.16 ERA in six games started by Tomas Nido and a 5.33 ERA in five games started by Ramos. (There was also one game with Travis d'Arnaud behind the plate which is better forgotten: it led to a 13.50 ERA.)
Mets manager Mickey Callaway said he had no choice but to pair Ramos with deGrom on Friday because Ramos played on Wednesday night and had to be off for Thursday's day game.
Of course, that's questionable, because Callaway could have simply played Nido on Wednesday and used Ramos Thursday and Friday. The real reason is Callaway doesn't want Nido to be deGrom's personal catcher, as he has stated many times, so deGrom and Ramos have to learn to work together.
DeGrom struck out leadoff batter Raimel Tapia on a 99-mile per hour fastball. Ramos seemed to catch that one pretty well.
Tapia got his revenge in the third inning with a two-out RBI double to the right-center-field wall to give the Rockies a 1-0 lead.
Colorado made it 2-0 in the fourth when three batters singled in a four-batter span. Desmond drove in the run with a one-out base hit to right.
DeGrom ended up throwing 112 pitches, which is two off his twice-reached season high. He gave up six hits, walked one and struck out 10.
DeGrom showed no signs of the hip cramp that led Callaway to remove his ace from his last start after just 89 pitches, much to deGrom's chagrin. The Mets, who were leading Arizona 5-1 at the time, suffered a 6-5 defeat.
The Mets were stymied on Friday by Rockies right-hander Antonio Senzatela (5-4) until Michael Conforto homered to right in the sixth to make it 2-1. It was Conforto's 12th home run, and it came two innings after he tried to bunt his way on but was thrown out by third baseman Nolan Arenado to open the fourth.
Smith followed Conforto's bunt with a walk and was on the move when Ramos hit a potential double-play ball to short. Trevor Story's throw went past second baseman Brendan Rodgers for an E4 as Smith _ after initially staying at second when he couldn't locate the ball in short right field _ scooted to third.
Todd Frazier, who hit the go-ahead home run in the eighth inning of the Mets' 7-3 win over the Giants on Thursday, fouled out to first for the second out (and heard some surprising boos from fans who must have missed Thursday's game). Amed Rosario lined to short to end the inning.
Senzatela went six innings, allowing four hits, walking two and striking out none. The Rockies have won 10 of their last 12.
