It's official: Mets further verify they're in this playoff race to the finish
Mets players celebrate their 7-0 win against the Nationals in an MLB game at Citi Field on Thursday. Credit: Kathleen Malone-Van Dyke
No more need to speculate about the 2024 Mets being a playoff team.
After Thursday’s 7-0 victory over the Nationals, it’s official. Not only did the Mets earn a share of the third wild-card spot with the idle Padres, a club they swept back in June, their long climb back from oblivion (11 games under .500 on June 2) further verified that Carlos Mendoza & Co. are staying in this October race to the finish.
How could anyone think otherwise? And it's beyond the stats, too. There’s a formula working in Flushing, and whether or not you choose to believe it was born from that May 29 clubhouse meeting during their darkest of times, something definitely clicked for the Mets.
Going 25-12 over the next six weeks to grab a piece of a wild card isn’t merely coincidental. Or the result of a few lucky bounces. The Mets have combined MLB’s most productive lineup (5.92 runs per game) during that span with a surprisingly sturdy rotation (2.67 ERA this month) to keep them competitive nearly every single night.
That’s why this isn’t a fluke. Unlike past seasons, when the Mets have been derailed by June swoons, they’ve already stared into the abyss — and bounced back. You don’t get this level of roster-wide performance without real clubhouse commitment, and the Mets are proving that to be the case.
“It’s been a complete, total team effort and I’m really, really proud of these guys,” said Brandon Nimmo, who’s become the de facto team captain, even without a John Franco-era C on his chest. “Because on a daily basis, you never know who’s going to come through.”
Except for Nimmo — he’s a sure thing. There’s no Met more dangerous in a big spot right now, and if it seems like he gets every huge hit, it’s only because Nimmo keeps doing precisely that. On Thursday, his bases-clearing double with two outs in the fifth inning finally snapped the scoreless tie and put the Mets in front to stay.
As great as the insightful Nimmo is at giving us the pulse of the clubhouse, he’s an even better leader by example, and the Mets have followed suit. Snubbed by the All-Star committee, Nimmo has played like an MVP instead, hitting .348 with a 1.151 OPS since June 14 and an MLB-best 30 RBIs during that stretch.
David Peterson, whose six scoreless innings spearheaded the Mets’ first shutout of the season (in Game No. 92), said they were “blessed” to have someone with Nimmo’s “consistency” guiding the way. That can’t be overestimated in New York, and especially over at Citi Field, which can be a very distracting (and distressing) place to work. But Flushing isn’t like that now, and with the highly functional Mets mowing through the NL’s crowded wild-card field, the confidence is rising.
“And it’s not just [Nimmo],” Peterson said. “It’s guys up and down the lineup, and I think guys feed off of it. You see someone doing the right stuff, and sticking to the process, and working hard, it motivates you to do the same. No one wants to be the guy that pulls this team down, so I think everybody’s working their butt off. Nimmo is a catalyst as to what that looks like.”
So was Thursday’s win, which moved the Mets two games over .500 (47-45) since they were 13-11 on April 24. After Nimmo cracked MacKenzie Gore, who allowed just one hit through the first four innings, J.D. Martinez and Pete Alonso followed with RBI singles. Later, in the eighth, the Mets provided a bigger cushion for their battered bullpen with a pair of run-scoring singles by Mark Vientos and Harrison Bader.
As for that relief corps, there’s likely better days ahead. The newly acquired Phil Maton pitched a perfect seventh inning (2 Ks), and the Mets certainly have done enough over the past six weeks to convince the front office to add more reinforcements before the July 30 trade deadline. They won’t have first-half revelation Reed Garrett for at least a month, but his right elbow is only nerve inflammation not a UCL tear. In the meantime, president of baseball ops David Stearns has to shore up the team’s most glaring weakness, and now has zero excuse for not going full steam ahead.
“We want to be buyers at the end of this month,” Nimmo said. “We believe we’re not that far off from being serious contenders. We’ve been playing really good baseball and we want to continue to do that.”
The Mets now have the runway to really gain some traction. They roll into the All-Star break with three games against the terrible Rockies (33-61) at Citi and return with a trip to Miami for four with the Marlins (32-60). After that is the Subway Series, Bronx edition, and while we’d normally consider that a sizable hurdle, not with these stumbling Yankees — and not after the Mets already humbled them in a two-game sweep at Citi last month.
“There’s a lot to like about this team that doesn’t show up in the boxscore,” Mendoza said.
Just check the wild-card standings, where we anticipate the Mets to be among the top three from now until October.
David Lennon is an award-winning columnist, a voter for baseball's Hall of Fame and has covered six no-hitters, including two perfect games.
