A hangover game for the Mets would have been annoying but forgivable Friday night, what with the team having just taken a series [1] — immediate and season — from the mighty Dodgers, AKA the Probably Inevitable NLCS Level Boss.
Happily, the Mets didn’t have one — or perhaps they did but the innate lousiness of the stripped-down Nationals was effective in hiding its symptoms.
Either way, they won [2] — and got contributions from a trio of players whom we’d at least begun to worry about.
Eduardo Escobar [3] was first, smacking a two-run homer off a Josiah Gray [4] curveball in the second to get the Mets pointed in the right direction. Escobar’s been vital in the clubhouse and valuable in the field but lacking at the plate; a late-season reversion to his career mean would certainly be a welcome addition to the lineup.
Next came Mychal Givens [5], who hasn’t exactly been the relief addition we’d clamored for at the deadline. (While it’s not Givens’ fault that he’s right-handed, it pretty much is his fault that the numbers he’s put up have been mostly wrong-footed.) But Givens pitched well against Los Angeles and even better against the Nats, coming in to direct water at a man-on-second, one-out, tie-game blaze after David Peterson [6] ran out of gas in the sixth. Givens did so, was handed a lead, pitched an effective seventh and earned a well-deserved win.
Thirdly, we had Pete Alonso [7], who’s looked desperately like a man in need of a head-clearing day off of late, doing more damage through bat-snapping shows of self-loathing than to the guys in the other uniforms. But Alonso came to the plate against Gray in the seventh with the Mets having just surrendered the lead and gave immediate notice that such an indignity would not stand, swatting the second pitch into the left-field seats and kicking off an inning that ballooned once the Nats commenced to play stupid.
(For the record, I still think a day off would be a good idea.)
The Braves won, so the Mets were thwarted in stretching their lead, and the gap between the two teams is too entirely too slim to ponder magic numbers and what-not. (I’ve peeked and you probably have too; let’s limit it to peeking for now.)
Whatever happens with the NL East standings, though, the Mets have won 85 games, which is worth a moment’s reflection.
I’d call 85 wins the lower bounds of a good year — definitely something to build on, if you get there from below. But it’s not even Labor Day. Now, I don’t think the Mets will wind up with 114 wins (though it’s not impossible), but those 29 remaining games are mostly against weak competition and the Mets look fundamentally sound with the stretch run upon them.
Numerical achievements don’t translate to flags — just ask the 2001 Mariners — but they’re still worth noting. And what the Mets are on track to do is notable indeed.