Jacob deGrom
With each start he makes, it becomes readily apparent if Jacob deGrom wins the Cy Young this season, he is going to do so with the lowest win total ever compiled by a starting pitcher. Looking at his stats, you really have no idea how he could be just 8-8. However, if you watched yesterday’s game, you know exactly why his record is that poor.
To no one’s surprise, deGrom began the game matching zeros with Madison Bumgarner in the first two innings. However, the Giants would break through in the third.
After Steven Duggar earned a leadoff walk, he would steal second. Devin Mesoraco would get out of his croutch slower than an old man reaching for a walker, and he would make a lollipop throw to second Travis d’Arnaud thought was bad. Duggar found himself on third after a Joe Panik groundout, and he would score when Mesoraco just missed a pitch, which would go back to the backstop.
Now, Home Plate Umpire Tony Randazzo was horrendous on the day, but despite Mesoraco’s complaints otherwise, Evan Longoria did not foul tip that ball. No, Mesoraco, who is showing himself to be a really poor catcher, flat out missed it. Mesoraco also failed to frame any number of pitches which would aid Randazzo in being a horrendous umpire.
The key call came in the fourth inning. With two outs and a runner on, deGrom threw an 0-2 pitch which led everyone in the ballpark to believe Nick Hundley just struck out looking:
Perhaps because he was frustrated, deGrom would walk Hundley, and then he would allow an RBI double to Bumgarner. At that point, it was 2-0 Giants, and with Bumgarner pitching, there was little to no hope the Mets would win this one.
Overall, this was an off-day for deGrom as he needed 108 pitches to get through six innings, and he would have a season high four walks. Of course, these struggles are indicative of just how great deGrom has been all season. In fact, a struggling deGrom limited the Giants to two runs (one earned) on four hits while he striking out 10.
As good as he was, Bumgarner was more dominant against a Mets lineup which featured Jeff McNeil batting sixth and Michael Conforto batting eighth.
The Mets would not even threaten Bumgarner until the fourth. There were two and two out, and McNeil hit a hard liner, but it was right at Panik.
It seemed as if the Mets may finally break through and get deGrom off the hook in the seventh. Todd Frazier led off the inning with a homer making him the first ever Met to homer off Bumgarner at Citi Field. Jose Bautista would get hit by a pitch, and McNeil would single. The rally would sputter as Kevin Plawecki, who had come on for an injured Mesoarco in the sixth, hit into a 6-4-3 double play.
That brought up Conforto. He battled back from 1-2 to draw a full count in a nine pitch at-bat. On the ninth pitch, Bumgarner beat Conforto inside with a well placed fastball to end the rally. Given how Gary Cohen, Keith Hernandez, and Ron Darling were harping on the false narrative Bumgarner ruined Conforto’s 2016 season, we should see more of the same for any poor play Conforto makes the rest of the year.
In the bottom of the ninth, the Mets had a chance to rally back from 3-1 against Tony Watson, who they had already gotten to in the series. The only problem was Tony Randazzo wasn’t going to have any of it.
It appeared Wilmer Flores drew a four pitch walk to start the ninth. Instead, Randazzo called an obvious ball a strike. Flores then went the other way as he has been doing so well lately only to line it directly at Panik. Like with deGrom earlier in the game, Flores had some choice remarks for Randazzo, who, again, was terrible.
The game would come down to McNeil, who both Randazzo and the third base umpire ruled did not check his swing leading the Mets and perhaps more importantly deGrom to a loss. Looking at this game, you really see just how much deGrom has working against him as he tries to win games. Ultimately, if he does not win the Cy Young, there should be a line of people offering apologies. On that line, we should see Mesoraco and Randazzo.
Game Notes: Dominic Smith sat against Bumgarner the day after hitting a home run. The Mets are now 19-41 in games Mesoraco has played.
Believe it or not, two years ago, Todd Frazier was part of a Toms River team who won the Little League World Series. Of course, you believe it because we are reminded of it all the time. But it wasn’t just Frazier with Little League World Series exploits. Michael Conforto is the only player to homer in both the World Series and the Little League World Series.
Considering the Mets connection with to the Little League World Series, it made them the natural choice to participate in the Little League Classic.
What made the choice even better was how much the team embraced it. Frazier was out there signing autographs. Jacob deGrom was interviewing Little Leaguers. Noah Syndergaard was sharing pitching grips with members of the Spanish team. Really, to a man, the Mets were taking pictures with the young players. Syndergaard and deGrom would join Steven Matz and Zack Wheeler in watching the game from the stands with the Staten Island Little League team.
The Mets also embraced the challenge on the field, which included Jason Vargas having his best start in a Mets uniform.
Surprisingly, the Phillies could not get to Vargas until the sixth when Carlos Santana hit a two run home run off of him. After a Wilson Ramos double, Mickey Callaway brought in Seth Lugo, the Quarterrican, to get out of the jam. At that point, it was too little too late for the Phillies.
The Mets first rally was started by Frazier (who else?). His leadoff single against Nick Pivetta was the first of four straight singles. The Jose Bautista and Kevin Plawecki singles would plate two runs. After a Vargas sacrifice bunt, Amed Rosario would hit a two RBI single to give the Mets an early 4-0 lead.
The Mets lead would grow to 7-0 before the Phillies would even score a run off of Vargas. Jeff McNeil plated two runs with an RBI single in the fourth, and Rosario plated a run with another RBI single in the sixth.
Things were going so well for the Mets that Dominic Smith, who was called-up as the 26th man for the game, would hit an RBI pinch hit double in the eight. With Brandon Nimmo hurting, the Mets are now considering keeping Smith up to play left field, which would obviously be the right thing to do.
Ultimately, the final score would be 8-1 as Lugo, Drew Smith, and Daniel Zamora, who was throwing filthy sliders, kept the Phillies off the board.
Game Notes: Asdrubal Cabrera went 1-for-17 against his former team in this series.
Yesterday, Aaron Nola threw a gem against the Mets which showed everyone the National League Cy Young race is far from over.
While that may be true, Jacob deGrom stepped on Nola’s mound and reminded everyone that while Nola and Max Scherzer may be in the Cy Young race, they have a lot to do to catch up to deGrom.
All season long deGrom has been great, but today may have been him at his best. Through eight, he was at 99 pitches, and still Mickey Callaway sent him out for that ninth to let deGrom go out and get his complete game.
Any chance of trouble arising after Carlos Santana‘s leadoff single we’re quickly erased after Wilson Ramos hit deGrom’s next pitch to Amed Rosario for a 6-4-3 double play.
When Nick Williams grounded out, deGrom had his complete game. His final line was 9.0 innings, seven hits, one unearned run, no walks, and nine strikeouts.
Really, deGrom was just that close to a shutout.
https://twitter.com/mlbreplays/status/1030954814492925952?s=21
Wilmer Flores made a nice play to get the lead out at second, but instead of eating the ball, Rosario made a low throw which went past deGrom.
The throw allowed Williams to score from second, but the Mets still got out of the inning as both deGrom and Jeff McNeil made a heads up play.
With Odubel Herrera making the ever so brief turn to first, he was fair game. McNeil got to first and got the tag down on the deGrom throw.
This was just one of several ways McNeil helped deGrom come away with his eight win of the season.
In the fifth, he flat out robbed Herrera of a hit:
The type of play that makes you go "wow."@JeffMcNeil805 makes it look easy again! pic.twitter.com/rOwt3wHn99
— New York Mets (@Mets) August 18, 2018
McNeil also started a fourth inning rally with a leadoff single against Jake Arrieta. When Arrieta threw one away trying to pick him off, he went to third, and he’d score on a Flores RBI single.
In the seventh, he hit an RBI triple off Luis Garcia to score Rosario. Add in a Devin Mesoraco homer earlier that inning, and the Mets would lead 3-0.
With deGrom pitching like deGrom, the Mets would win 3-1.
In the victory, deGrom lowered his already MLB best ERA to 1.71. He would also clear the 200 strikeout plateau. Basically, he continues to prove he’s the best pitcher in all of baseball with each and every start.
Game Notes: Brandon Nimmo missed another game after injuring his hand.
Two years ago, Noah Syndergaard and Aaron Nola would have been a complete mismatch with Syndergaard being a Cy Young candidate and Nola fighting his way to have his results match his stuff.
Today, like most of this season, the roles were reversed.
In what is a three headed race for the National League Cy Young with Max Scherzer and Jacob deGrom, Nola continued to make his case.
In seven innings, he limited the Mets to just one run in three hits while walking one and striking out 11.
That one run came in the fourth on a Todd Frazier sacrifice fly scoring Jeff McNeil.
By that point, it was 3-1 Phillies because the Phillies jumped all over Syndergaard with a three run first inning. The first run cane courtesy of an Asdrubal Cabrera RBI double.
Really, Syndergaard labored through the entire game with him not recording a single 1-2-3 inning.
Another indication was how he finally got a run of support from his offense, and he gave that run right back in the bottom of the inning.
All told, Syndergaard needed a season high 115 pitches just to get through 5.2 innings. In his 5.2 innings of work, he would allow four earned on eight hits with two walks and five strikeouts.
Another troubling sign for Syndergaard is the stolen bases are back. On the night, the Phillies were a perfect 5-for-5 in stolen base attempts. It wasn’t speedsters like Cesar Hernandez either. Carlos Santana and Jorge Alfaro would as well. For Alfaro, it was the first of his career.
In that sixth inning, Syndergaard left with a runner on second and two out. Daniel Zamora would make his MLB debut, and he would strike out Hernandez to end the inning.
Zamora’s MLB debut was great with him not allowing any hits and his walking one and striking out two in 1.1 scoreless innings.
Importantly, Zamora kept the Mets in the game with a chance to tie it after Nola departed.
In the eighth, Jeff McNeil hit a flyball to shallow left center just past the outstretched arm of Maikel Franco. With the ball briefly on no man’s land, McNeil hustled his way to second for a double.
McNeil then scored on an Austin Jackson RBI single just ahead of Rhys Hoskins throw.
Gabe Kapler then lifted Victor Arano for the left-handed Adam Morgan to face Michael Conforto.
Conforto would battle back from 0-2 to a full count, but he would strike out looking leaving the Mets down 4-2.
Pat Neshek got the save opportunity for the Phillies, and the Mets did get the tying run to the plate again. This time, Wilmer Flores flew out to right to end the game.
The Mets once again showed fight, but in the end, they lost because somehow, some way, Nola has become a much better pitcher than Syndergaard.
Game Notes: Bobby Wahl was placed on the 10 day disabled list, which made room for Zamora to get called up to the majors.
In preparation for this weekend’s Little League Classic at Williamsport, the Mets played in the Little League ballpark that is Yankee Stadium.
Right from the get-go, the Mets went to work with Amed Rosario hitting a leadoff homer off Luis Severino. That would be the first of five Mets homers on the night.
With that, the Mets had scored seven runs for Jacob deGrom, which made him winning this game a cinch, or at least that was the anticipation.
Between the Rosario first inning homer and the ensuing Jeff McNeil RBI single, the Mets had a 2-0 lead, which the defense would give back with poor defense in the third.
With two on, Giancarlo Stanton hit what should’ve been a 5-4-3 double play. Instead, with Brett Gardner making a hard slide (which may or nah not have been legal but was not challenged), McNeil threw it into the stands.
This not only forced Austin Romine home, but it also put Stanton at second. He’d score on an Aaron Hicks RBI single tying the game.
Surprisingly, after that, it was all Mets.
One of the reasons why was the Mets patient approach at the plate and their ability to lay off the Severino slider. All told, that would chase Severino after he threw 98 pitches over four innings.
Before he departed, Jose Bautista would tag him with a two run opposite field homer.
Things got a little interesting with Didi Gregorious hitting an RBI single scoring Gardner, who doubled earlier that inning, to pull the Yankees to with 4-3.
The Mets would then tee off on Yankees reliever A.J. Cole with Todd Frazier, Brandon Nimmo, and Michael Conforto hitting homers off of him to expand the Mets lead to 7-3.
BACK-TO-BACK! @mconforto8 pic.twitter.com/3CPCeXIGIC
— New York Mets (@Mets) August 14, 2018
deGrom would depart after 6.2 innings allowing two earned (three runs) in five hits. Of course, if not for the arcane double play error rules, it should’ve been one earned. As a result, deGrom’s ERA rose to 1.81.
In addition, deGrom would strike out 12 Yankee batters.
After Jerry Blevins got the last out of the seventh, Seth Lugo pitched the eighth, and he got tagged by Miguel Andujar with a two run homer to make an easy game a scary 7-5 game.
The Mets got one of those runs back in the top of the ninth off Zach Britton.
After Conforto was hit by a pitch, Wilmer Flores singled. With that single, each Met in the starting lineup recorded a hit.
McNeil then hit what could have been an inning ending double play, but Gleyber Torres couldn’t make the transfer (McNeil probably beats it anyway). With the ball on the ground, Conforto would score from second to give the Mets an 8-5 lead.
The Mets would load the bases, but Bautista couldn’t deliver that final knock out blue meaning Robert Gsellman would get the save chance.
Gsellman would deliver with a 1-2-3 inning for his seventh save of the season.
With that, believe it or not, the Mets split the Subway Series. If you believe that, can you believe deGrom got the win and is 7-7?
Game Notes: Noah Syndergaard did the player interview during the game, and he made a joke about hoping the Little Leaguers don’t have hand, foot, and mouth.
As reported by Mike Puma of the New York Post, Mets owner Fred Wilpon does not want to hire a younger and more analytics driven executive for two reasons. The first is he feels he will have a harder time connecting with that person. The second and perhaps all the more baffling is the “thought among team officials that perhaps the Mets became too analytics driven in recent seasons under Sandy Alderson’s watch . . . .”
Taking the thought at face value, we really need to question which analytics the Mets are using to inform their decisions.
For starters, look at Asdrubal Cabrera. Everyone knew he was no longer a shortstop, so that left the question over whether he should have been a second or third baseman heading into the 2018 season.
In 2017, Cabrera was a -6 DRS in 274.1 innings at second. That should have come as no surprise as he was a -10 DRS the last time he saw extensive action at second base (2014). Conversely, in his 350.1 innings at third last year, he had a 1 DRS.
Naturally, the Mets went with Cabrera at second this season where he has been an MLB worst -20 DRS. That makes him not just the worst second baseman in all of baseball, it makes him the worst defensive infielder in all of baseball.
Of course, the Mets got there by acquiescing a bit to Cabrera’s preference to play second over third. This was also the result of the team turning down a Paul Sewald for Jason Kipnis swap. That deal was nixed over money.
With respect to Sewald, he was strong when the season began. In April, he had a 1.91 ERA and a 0.805 WHIP. Since that point, Sewald has a 5.73 ERA, a 1.485 WHIP, and multiple demotions to Triple-A.
As for Kipnis, he has struggled this year hitting .226/.313/.363. It should be noted this was mostly due to a horrific April which saw him hit .178/.254/.243. Since that tough start to the season, Kipnis has gotten progressively better. Still, it is difficult to lose sleep over Kipnis even if the rejected trade put Cabrera at second and it led to the Mets signing Todd Frazier, who is hitting .217/.298/.368.
In addition to bringing Cabrera back into the fold, the Mets also brought back Jay Bruce after having traded the then impending free agent to the Cleveland Indians for Ryder Ryan.
At the time the Mets signed Bruce, they needed a center fielder. The team already had Yoenis Cespedes in left, and once he returned from the disabled list, the team was going to have Michael Conforto in right. Until the time Conforto was ready, the team appeared set with Brandon Nimmo in the short-term.
In 69 games in 2017, Nimmo hit .260/.379/.418. In those games, Nimmo showed himself to be a real candidate for the leadoff spot on a roster without an obvious one, especially in Conforto’s absence. With him making the league minimum and his having shown he could handle three outfield positions, he seemed like an obvious choice for a short term solution and possible someone who could platoon with Juan Lagares in center.
Instead, the Mets went with Bruce for $39 million thereby forcing Conforto to center where he was ill suited. More than that, Bruce was coming off an outlier year in his free agent walk year. Before that 2017 rebound season, Bruce had not had a WAR of at least 1.0 since 2013, and he had just one season over a 100 wRC+ in that same stretch. In response to that one outlier season at the age of 30, the Mets gave Bruce a three year deal.
Still, that may not have been the worst contract handed out by the Mets this past offseason. That honor goes to Jason Vargas.
The Mets gave a 35 year old pitcher a two year $16 million deal to be the team’s fifth starter despite the fact the team had real starting pitching depth. At the time of the signing, the Mets had Jacob deGrom, Noah Syndergaard, Steven Matz, Zack Wheeler, Matt Harvey, Seth Lugo, Robert Gsellman, Chris Flexen, and Corey Oswalt as starting pitching depth.
Instead of using five of them and stashing four of them in Triple-A, the Mets opted to go with Vargas as the fifth starter. Even better, they depleted their starting pitching depth by moving Gsellman and Lugo the to bullpen. Of course, this had the added benefit of saving them money thereby allowing them to sign Anthony Swarzak, a 32 year old reliever with just one good season under his belt.
The Mets were rewarded with the decision to sign Vargas by his going 2-8 with an 8.75 ERA and a 1.838 WHIP. He’s also spent three separate stints on the disabled list.
What’s funny about Vargasis he was signed over the objections of the Mets analytics department. From reports, Vargas was not the only one. Looking at that, you have to question just how anyone associated with the Mets could claim they have become too analytics driven. Really, when you ignore the advice of those hired to provide analytical advice and support, how could you point to them as the problem?
They’re not.
In the end, the problem is the same as it always has been. It’s the Wilpons.
They’re the ones looking for playing time for Jose Reyes at a time when everyone in baseball thinks his career is over. They’re the ones not reinvesting the proceeds from David Wright‘s insurance policy into the team. They’re the ones who have a payroll not commensurate with market size or World Series window. They’re the ones rejecting qualified people for a job because of an 81 year year old’s inability to connect with his employees.
Really, you’re not going to find an analytical basis to defend making a team older, less versatile, more injury prone, and worse defensively.
What you will find is meddlesome ownership who thinks they know better than everyone. That’s why they’re 17 games under .500 with declining attendance and ratings while saying the Yankees financial model is unsustainable at a time the Yankees are heading to the postseason again and the team has the highest valuation of any Major League team.
If you’ve watched MLB Network lately, you’ve seen Harold Reynolds make the case Max Scherzer should win the Cy Young over Jacob deGrom.
Now, there are valid reasons to consider Scherzer (or even the not oft discussed Aaron Nola) for the award this season.
With respect to Scherzer, he’s clearly established himself as the best pitcher in the National League over the past few years – even better than Clayton Kershaw. He’s also having another Cy Young caliber season.
Right now, Scherzer is 15-5 with a 2.28 ERA, 161.2 IP, 216 K, 0.897 WHIP, 12.0 K/9, and a 5.54 K/BB ratio. Overall, that’s good for a 6.5 pitching WAR.
Scherzer leads the league in wins, WHIP, strikeouts, innings, K/9, and K/BB ratio. He also leads the entire National League with a 7.2 WAR.
In many ways, Scherzer deserves the National League MVP because he does lead the league in WAR, and he almost single-handedly keeping the Nationals alive in the postseason race.
In games he pitches, the Nationals are 17-7, and when he doesn’t pitch they are 42-50.
Similar to the Nationals, the Mets are 39-51 on the days deGrom doesn’t pitch. On the days he does pitch, the Mets are 9-14.
Yes, the Mets are well under .500 when deGrom pitches.
They are under .500 despite deGrom having a Major League leading 1.77 ERA. He leads the National League in HR/9, ERA+, and FIP.
So, how is he 6-7 with his team having a losing record when he pitches? The answer is simple. His team is terrible.
There have been seven times this season he’s allowed no earned runs in a game. He’s only 2-0 in those starts.
He’s had 13 different starts where he’s gone at least seven innings while allowing two runs or fewer. In those starts, he’s 3-4. Yes, he has a losing record in games where he pitches deep into games allowing two runs or fewer.
For his part, Scherzer has 11 of those types of starts. He’s 7-2 in those starts. That’s a huge difference.
And despite all of this, Harold Reynolds is going to get up there and use wins as the reason Scherzer is better than deGrom. Not just their wins, but team wins.
In some warped and deluded thought process, Reynolds actually believes Scherzer pitching in front of a better and not a worse team makes him a better pitcher.
Overall, there are cogent arguments to be made on Scherzer over deGrom. Innings, strikeouts, and WHIP do matter. Yes, to a certain extent wins should matter.
That said, when you’re using wins as the crux of your argument while completely ignoring how the respective teams played behind each pitcher, you’ve effectively announced to the world you aren’t putting the time in to do the research required to effectively do your job.
No one is saying Reynolds should be fired over this. That’s silly. However, we do have to question why MLB holds him out as their lead commentator on their own network.
I guess that’s another thing Rob Manfred will blame Mike Trout for happening.
Last year, Player’s weekend was a hit as fans got to see their favorite players wear fun jerseys featuring their nicknames on the back of their jerseys. Believe it or not, some of those were nicknames were rejected for various reasons.
For example, Brandon Nimmo wanted to use his Twitter handle, You Found Nimmo, but MLB was afraid of copyright issues. When it came to Kyle Seager, he wanted to go with “Corey’s Better.” With that rejected, he paid homage to his brother Corey Seager by merely noting on his jersey he was “Corey’s Brother.”
Well, the Mets officially approved Player’s Weekend nicknames and jerseys have been released. However, as noted with Nimmo, there were other names the players wanted which were rejected by MLB:
Tyler Bashlor – Mickey, I’m Available To Pitch
Jose Bautista – Trade Value Going, Going, Gone!
Jerry Blevins – One Magic LOOGY
Michael Conforto – Shouldering The Load
Travis d’Arnaud – d’L
Jacob deGrom – Fewest Wins 4 Cy Young Winner
Phillip Evans – DFA TBA
Wilmer Flores – ????????
Todd Frazier – Regrets, I’ve Joined The Mets
Robert Gsellman – Don’t Care What You Think
Luis Guillorme – Assistant to the Regional Manager
Austin Jackson – 2019 Opening Day CF
Juan Lagares – Out For The Season
Seth Lugo – Quarterrican (That’s perfection; you don’t mess with that)
Steven Matz – Not So Strong Island
Jeff McNeil – 2B/3B/OF
Devin Mesoraco – Harvey’s Better
Brandon Nimmo – Don’t Worry, Be Happy
Corey Oswalt – Vargas (figured it was the only way he would get a start)
Kevin Plawecki – Plawful
Jose Reyes – Melaza Virus
Jacob Rhame – Stay (Refers to his roster spot and glasses)
Amed Rosario – Mentor Wanted
Paul Sewald – AAAAll Star
Dominic Smith – Waist And Future Gone
Drew Smith – Mickey, I’m Available To Pitch (Yes, it’s a repeat of Bashlor. They’re trying to prove a point.)
Anthony Swarzak – Still Just One Good Season
Noah Syndergaard – 60’6″ Away
Jason Vargas – $16 Million Dollar Man
Bobby Wahl – After All, I’m Your . . .
Zack Wheeler – Finally Good
David Wright – Hurts Here Doc
With Jacob deGrom entering today’s game with an MLB best 1.85 ERA and a career 1.99 ERA in day games, you knew he was going to completely shut down the Reds.
Even with him getting squeezed a bit by the home plate umpire leading to an increased pitch count, deGrom would dominate yet again. In his six scoreless innings pitched, deGrom limited the Reds to just four hits and a walk while he struck out 1o.
Two of those four hits would come in the first inning with Phil Ervin and Scooter Gennett hitting back-to-back one out singles. After Eugenio Suarez struck out, the Reds put on a play in an attempt to score a run.
Gennett broke for second, and he was supposed to stop when Devin Mesoraco threw through. Gennett would go too far leaving him in position to get tagged out by Amed Rosario before Ervin could score.
While it was surprising the Mets made a good defensive play and took advantage of another team’s error, it was all the more surprising the Mets scored some runs for deGrom. In fact, he would get eight runs of support, which was more than he received in any game he has had since the middle of June, which was a Mets game in Coors Field.
To put it in perspective, over his last four starts, the Mets scored six runs for him. In entire Month of July, he received 10 runs of support. Basically, today was an extreme and welcome outlier.
The first run came in the second inning when Austin Jackson doubled home Michael Conforto from first. Conforto and Jackson would once again take part in the scoring in the fifth.
Conforto would get a one out hustle double, and he would come home to score on a Brandon Nimmo RBI double. Nimmo scored on Jackon’s second RBI single of the game.
At that point, it was 5-0 Mets as in the previous inning, Reds starter Robert Stephenson loaded the bases by intentionally walking Mesoraco to pitch to deGrom. deGrom would help his own cause by walking on four pitches, and Rosario would tack on another run with a sacrifice fly.
At 5-0 in the fifth, deGrom had nearly a half month’s worth of run support. After six, it was up to the bullpen to make sure they didn’t blow a big lead for a pitcher everyone on the Mets owed a win.
Seth Lugo, Jerry Blevins, and Robert Gsellman did their job by pitching three scoreless to give deGrom the rare win.
The use of Gsellman was certainly odd as the Mets rallied in the eighth to tack on three runs. Again, that was the result of Conforto and Jackson at work. Conforto, who walked, scored with Wilmer Flores on Nimmo’s double, and once again, Nimmo scored on a Jackson RBI base hit. This one was a double.
Speaking of Nimmo, this was a nice bounceback game for him with his going 3-for-5 with three runs, three doubles, and three RBI.
All-in-all, this was a very good game for the Mets, and it was the type of game which will hopefully get deGrom that Cy Young Award he so richly deserves.
Game Notes: A day after Mickey Callaway said he isn’t pressured by anyone, specifically the Wilpons, to play Jose Reyes, Reyes announced he wants to return to the Mets next season.
This is exactly the way the Mets are supposed to play things over the final two months of the season. Sure, it’s easy to say that after a 3-0 win, but even if the Mets fell behind or lost the lead, they did he right thing.
Zack Wheeler, who the Mets were right to hold onto at the trade deadline, once again showed the Mets he’s turned a corner.
Over seven shutout innings, Wheeler linter a Braves team who had the third highest batting average in the majors and the fourth most runs in the National League to just three hits and one walk.
Really, Wheeler dominated from the jump with him striking out the side in the first, which would set the tone for a none strike out night. Overall, only one Brave would even reach second against Wheeler.
That was Freddie Freeman with a leadoff double to start the seventh. Wheeler responded by getting three quick outs.
With this not being a Jacob deGrom start, Wheeler would get the run support he would need to get the win.
The first run, and really only run needed came in the second when new Brave Kevin Gausman hit Todd Frazier. He’d quickly move to third on a Jeff McNeil double.
Overall, McNeil was a perfect 4-for-4 as he raised his batting average from .190 to .320.
The Mets mostly squandered the two on no out situation, but Amed Rosario was still able to get Frazier home on a fielder’s choice to give the Mets a 1-0 lead.
Once again, it was Frazier and McNeil getting things started. They’d follow a Michael Conforto sixth inning leadoff single with consecutive singles to both load the bases and chase Gausman.
Austin Jackson hit one off the reliever Shane Carle for an RBI leadoff single. Kevin Plawecki brought the next run home with a sacrifice fly.
Once again, it was an opportunity largely squandered, but the Mets did enough to get a 3-0 lead.
Surprisingly, Mickey Callaway would tab Bobby Wahl for the eighth. He’d get into some trouble, but he worked around it to get the ball to Robert Gsellman.
Gsellman for the ninth is an inspired move as it lets you know if he could be part of the later inning bullpen mix.
Well, tonight, Gsellman was up for the challenge much loot McNeil was just for almost the full night.
Overall, the Mets have young players and a chance to play them. For tonight, it worked.