It was a successful Mets debut for Paul Blackburn, who put a bunch of runners on base but came out mostly unscathed. The Mets had a bunch of hits and wound up with a 5-1 win over the Angels to start out their 10-game road trip Friday night in Anaheim.
Blackburn gave up six hits, two walks and a hit batter in his six innings yet it seemed like more than that. Still, he didn’t get rattled and threw enough strikes to keep his fielders engaged. The Mets turned two really nice double plays in the game that kept the Angels at bay. Blackburn allowed just one run and that one wouldn’t have scored if Mark Vientos fielded a hard-hit ball cleanly. We’ll gladly take 10 more starts just like this one from Blackburn.
The big hit in the game was a no-doubt homer by Pete Alonso in the third inning that broke a 1-1 tie. The Mets scratched out two more runs in the sixth inning, aided by some lousy defense by the Angels.
Jose Butto came on and dominated for two innings, yielding to Phil Maton in the ninth. Maton wasn’t as electric as Butto but he had a 1-2-3 frame, with a strikeout to end the game.
David Peterson goes Saturday night for the Mets, in a game with a 9:38 p.m. start.
This was supposed to be the ace for the Angels and he had pitched well lately, so it’s nice to get the win. Everyday the focus needs to be on that game. Expected Butto to go the third inning as he did last time in order to be stretched out some, but I guess Maton needed the work too.
Nice win against the Halos and a strong pitching performance from Blackburn. He gave us exactly what we needed, a better start than Tylor Megill. Six strong innings, two walks, six Ks and he pitched out of trouble. Butto was unhittable and I too expected him to go three but Maton did the job. Nice to see Nimmo with three hits and everyone had a hit up and down the order. Taylor did his part in RF and had two hits as did Pinky out of the nine hole. This is a pretty good hitting team that scores runs – something Brian has been talking about for months. Peterson and Quintana have an advantage over the Angel starters in the next two and quite honestly they need the sweep over this lowly team to keep moving forward. Tied for the third wild card spot and incredibly only seven behind the division leading Phillies who’ve lost eight of their last ten games. After 109 games the Phillies have only won seven more times than the Mets. Perhaps Ya Gotta Believe has been replaced by OMG. This team has swagger. And with the new relievers seem to just need six from their starters to get a win.
Gut Reaction: Blackburn pitch a good game for a fifth starter. A lot of traffic but no accidents. With the acquisition of Blackburn the role of Butto should be defined by Mendoza. Right now, he should be the setup man for Diaz, therefore, he shouldn’t be in a game that the Mets are winning 5-1. It is a waste of resources. Maybe they would be better off having Butto in the rotation and Peterson in the bullpen.
Alonso is heating up for the last two weeks. If he does a Cespedes August and September then anything can happen.
Nice start for the road trip. Let’s win the series tonight.