HOUSTON — After months of anticipation, the Mets finally got to see Juan Soto in action for real on Thursday.
And there he was on Opening Day, with runners on the corners, two outs and the Mets trailing by a pair of runs against Astros lefty closer Josh Hader.
“You feel it,’’ Clay Holmes said of what the atmosphere was like in the dugout during the top of the ninth inning of the Mets’ 3-1 loss to Houston at Daikin Park.
“Everybody saying ‘Let’s get Juan up and see what happens,’ ” Holmes said. “He’s able to do it, and obviously, more times than not, we feel really good about it.”
This time, though, Soto came up short.
Hader started Soto off with a sinker that missed high, as did the second pitch of the at-bat, a slider that ended up low.
With the count 2-0, Soto took another sinker outside the zone, up and away.
At that point, Soto took another slider, this one for a strike, right in the heart of the plate.
And then Soto had what Carlos Mendoza said was Soto’s best swing of the at-bat, a sinker that he fouled off.
“He put his ‘A’ swing there,” Mendoza said. “He just missed it.”
Soto then circled the batter’s box before the next pitch, when he got a 3-2 slider that ended up well off the plate.
Soto offered a very un-Soto-like swing and the weak offering wasn’t close, as Soto’s first game with the Mets ended in disappointment.
“I was expecting to be up in that moment, that situation,’’ Soto said of the opportunity to potentially tie the game with an extra-base hit. “[Hader] let the ball go on that last pitch and got me on that one. It was a pretty good pitch down and away.”
Soto acknowledged he didn’t think a slider was coming.
“I was expecting his best pitch,” Soto said. “His best pitch is a fastball. I was sitting on a fastball.”
“That was a pretty nasty pitch by Hader,’’ Mendoza said of the final slider. “He got him this time.”
And Soto insisted he would have been fine drawing a walk to load the bases for Pete Alonso, something he would have done last year, with Aaron Judge behind him.
“For me, I don’t mind taking a walk right there,” Soto said. “Pete’s behind me, a really good power hitter. I think we have a good chance right there, lefty [versus] righty. He just got me in that situation.”
