Neil Walker [1] apparently forgot how many outs there were. Jose Reyes [2] ensured there were more outs than there should have been. Jacob deGrom [3] walked five batters, gave up five runs and barely made it through five innings. Glenn Sherlock betrayed a fetishistic fondness for red lights when green would have been the stylish choice. Curtis Granderson [4]’s numbers remained too small to observe sans microscope. Travis d’Arnaud [5] had to sit. Addison Reed [6] had to fume.
What a mess these Mets were on Wednesday night. How they beat the Braves by eleven runs [7] we’ll never know.
Or maybe we already know. They hit like crazy. They hit safely twenty times, including twelve times with runners in scoring position. They did it without a single ball leaving the hospitable confines of SunTrust Park. They whupped up on beloved ex-Met Bartolo Colon [8], they whupped up on less-beloved ex-Met Eric O’Flaherty [9], they whupped up on a couple of other Braves hurlers besides. They cloned [10] the 16-5 Unicorn Score [11] that roamed Minnesota four years before and effectively echoed the joyous Minneapolis sound their predecessors’ bats made that frigid Friday night [12].
They made so much noise in the general vicinity of Atlanta that they definitively drowned out their shortfalls of judgment and lack of attention to detail. Sherlock (sufficiently spooked by Ender Inciarte [13]’s arm) could hold up only so many runners; Walker (having run full speed on a popup with one out) could mindlessly break from second only so often; Reyes (traipsing back toward second at less than a snail’s pace, thus enabling a heady tagout from Dansby Swanson [14]) could be caught sleepwalking only once. Various Mets looked bad at various points, but every Met with a bat hit just about always.
Incredibly plentiful and impeccably timely hitting will smooth your rough edges to a high-gloss finish. The Mets scored sixteen runs at SunTrust, marking the twentieth game in their 56-year history in which they’ve tallied at least that many. They are 20-0 on those occasions of offensive onslaught. If you can’t mask your imperfections with sixteen runs, you might want to try a different sport.
For one night, baseball fit the Met skill set just fine. Sherlock waved enough runners home without incident. Walker obscured his first-inning baserunning blunder by scoring twice. Reyes drove in five, decent penance for indecent fundamentals. DeGrom’s struggle with command was frustrating to watch but his uncharacteristically flat performance couldn’t pull the Braves any closer than four runs behind once he was done pitching. If you didn’t love Jacob on the mound, you had to embrace him at the plate. He contributed a pair of hits and RBIs to help his and every other interested party’s cause. D’Arnaud’s wrist may be a going concern, but René Rivera [15] batted six times in his place and gathered three hits. Granderson — .137/.186/.242 notwithstanding — may have begun to dig out of his sinkhole. Curtis doubled twice, scored thrice and, when he stood in against Colon, provided a nice reminder [16] that Sandy Alderson executed a pretty good free agent signing period [17] in December 2013.
Everybody in the lineup did something positive. No starter posted an ohfer. It was a team effort all the way. DeGrom rarely requires rescue, but four relievers aided and abetted him without turning a blowout into a slugfest. Terry Collins inserted Reed in the seventh, an inning earlier than is customary (and a half-inning before the Mets slathered on an additional seven runs). Reed hadn’t been pitching all that well, so maybe there was a managerial message embedded in using him early. Or maybe Terry wanted Reed in the game against the middle of the Braves’ order in the seventh rather than its bottom in the eighth. That was the manager’s postgame explanation for Reed’s recasting. Dugout cameras inferred reliever discontent [18], but the setup man of record, who recently questioned the statistical glory attached to ninth-inning success [19], got his 4-5-6 men in order. Later Addison attributed his visible irritation solely to his dissatisfaction with how he threw, not when he threw.
Phew, that’s a relief. So is a fourth win in six games by however many runs. One is sufficient. Eleven is delightful.