The Mets had the makings of a first-inning rally Sunday afternoon, and Buck Showalter called for a replay review to help the cause.
They won the challenge, but still lost the baserunner.
The sequence in question came with no outs and Brandon Nimmo on first base. Starling Marte hit a ground ball to second base. Ehire Adrianza charged and fielded the ball, with Nimmo running toward him. Adrianza appeared to tag a sliding Nimmo and then threw to first base, but too late to complete the double play.
Braves first baseman Matt Olson then threw back to second base, where shortstop Dansby Swanson tagged Nimmo (who hadn’t gotten all the way to the bag) though second base umpire Jeff Nelson had signaled that Nimmo was already out.
Showalter challenged the call, and replays showed that Adrianza had tagged Nimmo with an empty glove and not with the ball, which was in his right hand. After a lengthy delay, Nelson, the crew chief, announced that Nimmo was in fact safe on the initial tag, but was ultimately out on the second tag from Swanson.
That drew the ire of Showalter, who walked back on the field to have a lengthy conversation with Nelson, which at first appeared calm before becoming more animated. Somehow, Showalter was able to avoid an ejection — arguing contested replay decisions is supposed to result in an automatic ejection — which would have been his first as the Mets manager. The crowd chanted “Buck” as he continued to argue, though he eventually returned to the dugout.
“If we [didn’t] only have two pitchers available, or three, in the bullpen, I probably wouldn’t have seen the rest of that game,” Showalter quipped after the 5-2 win. “You’re penalizing the runner for the umpire’s mistake. It’s like an inadvertent whistle. You can’t penalize anybody after the inadvertent whistle.”
A similar play happened earlier this season, when the Mets were in Miami, but a replay review rewarded Nimmo second base in that instance.
“It’s a head-scratcher,” Showalter said. “It’s just very inconsistent.”
Nimmo said he asked for clarification after the inning, in which the Mets did not score.
“I’m [called] out, so I’m not going to try to do anything,” Nimmo said. “So I stood up and what they told me is that me standing up, I guess, had me advancing to second base. So … the throw to second base and then the tag to get me, that’s what made me out. We’re a little confused by it, that’s for sure.”