You know the old baseball saying: The team that has the sixth-best record in the league, assuming it’s at least the third-best non-first place record in that same league, is a lock to go to the postseason. And if it’s not an old saying, let’s repeat it enough so it becomes one.
Congratulations to our ceaselessly beloved 2024 New York Mets, in whom we’ve never expressed a scintilla of doubt [1], for moving into playoff position with a mere 70 games to go in the regular season. Keep winning, and this thing is in the bag.
[2]If the playoffs started today…alas they do not.
Who would engage the services of one of those MLB-approved tout services that advertise during broadcasts and bet against these Mets right now? Right now, they’re barely stoppable. Against the Washington Nationals this week, rolling through Thursday afternoon, they were truly unstoppable, sweeping away [3] the perpetually pesky Nats in their series at Citi Field and adding an exclamation point by shutting them out in the finale.
That part was particularly nice, considering the Mets hadn’t shut out anybody all year. The zero drought hadn’t gone on long enough to develop into an albatross, but it was getting there. All it required to become a trend was its continuation. The Mets hadn’t no-hit anybody for 91 games in 1962. The next thing you knew, we were waiting 50 years for our first no-hitter.
By the time mopup man Adam Ottavino was called on to not give up a run in the top of the ninth — he did everything but — the bottom-line result was as secure as one could hope. The Mets were up, 7-0, which indicates eight innings of superb pitching supported at some point by robust hitting. The Mets did their scoring in two frames — five runs in the fifth, another pair in the eighth. Brandon Nimmo [4], apparently one of the best players to never be recognized [5] by any awards voter in any realm ever, delivered the key blow, as Brandon Nimmo has been doing most every game. The Mets loaded the bases in the fifth in that admirable way they have when they’re being their best. Their backup catcher Luis Torrens doubled off MacKenzie Gore to lead off, vouching for depth that attests to the ability to give Francisco Alvarez an occasional blow. Beleaguered Jeff McNeil, who has fallen so far in popular esteem that one could discern a collective sigh from Flushing when it was realized Jose Iglesias was not available to play second base Thursday, gritted out a walk. OMG, the Squirrel still has some life left in his bushy tail. Superstar who avoids being chosen for games with stars in them Francisco Lindor also worked a walk, one of those acts of patience and selflessness that tingles our spine when it means a rally is gaining tumescence.
Then Nimmo goes Wham-O, with a dart of a double to the center field wall that brings in all three baserunners. Brandon had homered in the three preceding games, but this half-a-homer seemed more authoritative than any of his dingers. Home run streaks are freaks of nature. Hard hitting that finds gaps just keeps coming. Getting Nimmo across the plate would make the inning that much better…and, would ya look at that? J.D. Martinez drove him home, and Pete Alonso did the same solid for Martinez.
David Peterson [6] was making his 72nd career start Thursday. The first 71 indicated little definitive about his future, other than to hint that once you’ve been on the scene quite a while taking semi-regular rotation turns and it’s still not certain what to make of you or your role, you have tangibly less future than you used to. Peterson has been around since 2020, the season none of us went to the ballpark to watch him pitch. On the current active roster, only Nimmo, McNeil and Alonso predate him. He’s coming up on his 29th birthday, transmitting a perceptible signal that calling him one of our “young starters” is a misnomer. He’s been in and out of the Mets plans for five seasons now, judged neither discardable nor indispensable. Good starts. Bad starts. Indifferent impressions. As a first-round draft choice, he didn’t have the benefit of sneaking up on anybody. As a perennial contingency option every season dating back to the COVID campaign, he hasn’t overwhelmed opposing hitters, let alone organizational decisionmakers.
In his 72nd career start, David Peterson pitched for the first time like he was an indisputably vital component of the New York Mets staff. The circumstances demanded it. On July 11? We can read a calendar, but the same ballclub reasonably left for dead in late May had revived itself to the point where it could pass every also-ran and move, if only for a day, into position to look down on all of them. Once he was staked to a 5-0 lead, Peterson had to hold it in place. Had to pitch one more scoreless inning. He’d struggled a bit earlier, but had righted himself with no runs permitted. He’d outlasted Gore. Now he’d have to outlast the Nat bats altogether. The Mets would be eligible to win if Peterson went only 5.1 IP, or had he let the score become 5-2, but this wasn’t a day for dithering or dilly-dallying. Shut out Washington in the sixth. Post a sixth zero. Establish yourself as best you can amid the more veteran starters Quintana, Severino and Manaea, who aren’t about to be dislodged; the rookie Scott who hasn’t given anybody a reason to return him to Triple-A; and the nearly rehabilitated Senga, who is on track to pitch in the majors again soon (no, really). Do everything you can to make sure that when this day is done, the Mets are a playoff team, never mind that the playoffs are more than two-and-a-half months away. Do all that, and you’re locking yourself into everybody’s plans in these parts.
David Peterson did what he had to in the sixth on Thursday. He threw three ground ball outs around a single walk and didn’t give up a run. He kept the Mets ahead, 5-0, as did bullpen import Phil Maton [7] for an inning, as Maton gave us hope that he can be this summer’s version of Rick White. We needed more relief help in July of 2000. We need more relief help every July. That July, we had our eyes on the postseason. We don’t always look that far down the road. We acquired White from the Rays when they were the Devil Rays. White, among others, pitched us into October and acquitted himself there splendidly. Erstwhile Ray Phil [8] put down a marker of his own with a spotless seventh. Danny Young didn’t display his stealth magic in the eighth, but Dedniel Nuñez did. Another zero. Two more runs came around in the bottom of the inning to make the Met lead surely immune to implosion. Then Otto came on to test that assessment. Lord knows he did what he could to poke holes in budding presumptuousness, loading ’em up with one out and compelling the simultaneous loosening of Edwin Diaz and tightening of our chests. We were pretty sure we were gonna win. But we really wanted that shutout.
Adam reached down to remember he’s no mopup man at heart. He struck out James Wood looking and Jesse Winker swinging. Ottavino escaped any damage. The Mets, 7-0 victors, left behind the notion they can’t shut out any opponent. They also rose .001 above the pack that crams the also-running portion of the Wild Card derby.
Sixth-best record in the league. Third-best among teams not in first place in one of the three divisions. There was a time that and correct fare would get you on the subway. These days, it could very well take you for a ride on the express track.