After taking two of three games from the Dodgers, the Mets had to salvage this closeout game against the Giants to avoid a losing road trip. And win they did. Sean Manaea appeared to be on life support several times but somehow managed to finagle is way out of all jams until he was pulled with two outs in the fifth. Poor call in my opinion as they were up 6-0 at the time and he deserved a chance at a win, despite how meaningless that stat has become.
Francisco Lindor lead the way going 4-5 with two home runs and four RBI. More importantly, he is finally over the Mendoza line. Tyrone Taylor contributed a double and home run and three RBI. Jeff McNeil chipped in two hits and an RBI, Brett Baty managed a single, as did Pete Alonso and they both scored on Taylor’s double. The other four Met starters all took 0-fers but at least Nimmo walked twice and scored both times ahead of Lindor bombs.
Manaea was yanked after pitch 101 and the normally unhittable Reed Garrett – 7 hits in 12 and two thirds prior to today – struggled a bit giving up two hits, a walk and a run to explode his ERA up to .71. He does get the win and leads the team at 3-0. Adam Ottavino threw an inning and a third and looked strong striking out three. The underworked Edwin Diaz gave up two hits and could have escaped the inning except for a very sloppy toss from Pete Alonso.
All in all, it was nice to win one and I’m sure they will be thrilled to hop a flight home and have a rare day off tomorrow.
This was a big win for the Mets. They took advantage of the opponent throwing a pen game, ended the skid, got the trip to a fell good 3-3, and their best player had a huge game and broke the Mendoza line (not the manager lol). A good day in Met land.
Gut Reaction: Taylor had a nice game again. He is a fundamentally sound ball player . With Martinez on the horizon Taylor is not going to get his at bats unless shares center field with Bader. Taylor is a better player. With a six-run lead and only one out more, they should have left Manaea to get the win, at least until the Giants scored.
I don’t feel bad about the losses to Tyler Glasnow and Logan Webb. Those are two top-notch pitchers who were both at the top of their game. The Keaton Winn loss is the one that hurts. And this one would have hurt, too, if it broke that way. Fortunately Lindor and Taylor brought their HR bats and it didn’t happen.
Mets are now 5-2 in blowouts, which is great to see. A bad team can luck itself to a good record in one-run games. It’s much more difficult to do that in blowout games.