Shaky victory isn't half-bad for Mets
New York Mets relief pitcher Dominic Leone reacts during the 10th inning of a baseball game Wednesday, June 14, 2023, in New York. (AP Photo/Frank Franklin II) Credit: AP/Frank Franklin II
Ok, so maybe this wasn’t the most Mets’ win ever. But given the circumstances, the Subway Series, the cratering season, the numerous face-palming episodes leading up to Brandon Nimmo’s redemptive walk-off RBI double, Wednesday night’s 4-3 victory over the Yankees (in 10 innings) was right up there.
Even third-year owner Steve Cohen, still a relative newbie at the steering wheel while writing the big checks, sympathized with his fellow Mets’ fans after the team scraped together only its second "W" in the past 11 games. You would think after what Buck Showalter & Co. had endured lately — the agonizing sweep in Atlanta, getting pasted in Pittsburgh, the Yankees’ gut punch from the previous night — that Cohen might let his team savor this Subway split for a few hours.
Nope. Cohen immediately took to Twitter, only minutes after Nimmo was surrounded by his jumping teammates in celebration, to put the victory in perspective.
“That was a crazy game,” Cohen tweeted. “Too many mental mistakes, but I will take it.”
Just in case anyone was wondering if the Mets’ mega-billionaire boss is paying attention. Cohen didn’t waste too many characters in getting his point across, and eventually Showalter also had to concede the Mets still have some cleaning up to do — beyond the sticky stuff that caused Drew Smith to earn himself a 10-game suspension Wednesday afternoon.
Things could have been much worse, obviously. The Mets were en route to being swept in this Subway Series, only nine outs away, before denting a Yankees’ bullpen that’s the most airtight in baseball. They basically flushed Justin Verlander’s best start in nearly a month (six innings, three hits, one run) and somehow managed to screw up their tying rally in the seventh inning.
At first glance, it looked like Nimmo got a bit too bold on Starling Marte’s two-out RBI-single, which pulled the Mets even at 3. As Nimmo took a wide turn around second base — hoping to draw a throw that would allow Mark Vientos to score the go-ahead run — the plan backfired badly. Nimmo got the attention he wanted, as catcher Joe Trevino cut him down diving back into the base. But there was one problem: Vientos stayed anchored at third base.
“I liked my thinking there,” Nimmo said. “It was aggressive, and I think in that situation, I like it. But other things happened in front of me that didn’t allow that. I think I was just surprised how things unfolded in the front. We were all just trying to think the game through, but it happens.”
Yes, stuff happened Wednesday. A lot of stuff. And other than Verlander, or the solid work by five relievers (minus Smith) or Nimmo’s heroics, there were plenty of sketchy moments that knocked this game sideways for the Mets. The Yankees built a 3-1 lead mostly on charity from their crosstown rivals — they were a stunning 1-for-15 with runners in scoring position — and that’s how Showalter’s crew has been losing many of these games recently, in the margins.
The Yankees’ first run off Verlander was set up when Starling Marte airmailed a throw to third base that should have easily gunned down Trevino trying to advance on the fly-ball out. They scored two more in the seventh inning, the first run on a botched double-play that never should have been attempted. Not only did Jeff McNeil try an ill-fated relay throw that had no chance of getting the speedy Isiah Kiner-Falefa, but Vientos laid out for it rather than block the ball — the error allowing Josh Donaldson to come around.
The second run was aided by rookie catcher Francisco Alvarez sailing a throw into centerfield on IKF’s steal of second, the error then putting him on third. From there, Kiner-Falefa shocked the Mets by swiping home, with Eduardo Escobar not even making an effort to hold him on and lefty reliever Brooks Raley unable to steady himself, firing a head-high fastball to the backstop. That was flat-out embarrassing.
“We scored more runs than they did over the course of the game and it was a big win for us,” Showalter said. “Any win is good. There were things that we were able to overcome. We’d like to see them not happen. But I think sometimes guys are trying so hard to find a way to contribute, that sometimes through that mistakes are made.
“Obviously I don’t take a blind-eye to those things. I know how much they care and those are things we’ll talk about before the next game.”
Bottom line, beating the Yankees, even in dramatic fashion, isn’t going to magically cure the Mets’ problems. Thanks to Smith’s suspension, they have to play shorthanded for 10 games, and we learned Wednesday that the Mets had been keeping Daniel Vogelbach glued to the bench for the past week as sort of a break from the grind, which is how the slumping DH described it.
So the issues didn’t vanish in Nimmo’s on-field dance party. But they didn’t feel quite as onerous after salvaging a split of the Subway Series.
“Everything’s better when we win,” Nimmo said. “When you win, you can look back on things and say, OK, we’ll learn from them.”
Judging from Cohen’s tweet, the owner would probably like that.
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.
