It doesn’t get any better than the first Braves-Mets series
The Braves come to Citi Field this weekend for 4 video games that may finish April after which open May within the National League East. One factor, although, hasn’t modified since final October: The Braves are nonetheless forward of the Mets.
It doesn’t imply they are going to be by Monday afternoon, when this sequence ends. Or that the Braves can be higher by this October. It’s solely two video games within the loss column separating the 2 groups as they head into Friday evening’s recreation. But for now, the Braves are nonetheless kings of the hill within the East.
The Mets nonetheless don’t have Justin Verlander, who isn’t scheduled to hitch the season till subsequent week in Detroit. Max Scherzer received’t pitch this weekend, as he continues to serve out a suspension due to an excessive amount of sticky substance on his pitching hand in Los Angeles final week. So, the Mets are at the moment diminished. Still: This weekend sees the resumption of a rivalry nearly as good and actual as any in baseball proper now.
Both the Mets and Braves received 101 video games final season. The Mets had been 10 1/2 video games forward of the Braves. In the top, although, the Braves had been 10-9 towards the Mets and received the three that mattered most, the final three in Atlanta. The Braves received the division and received themselves a first-round bye; the Mets misplaced to the Padres within the NL Wild Card Series and went residence.
Now it begins up once more between them.
The Mets come into the sequence after their rousing 9-8 comeback win towards the Nationals on Thursday evening. It appeared as if the 4 video games in a row they’d misplaced after their 7-3 West Coast journey may was about to change into 5. They’d been forward, 7-3, going into the eighth. Only the Nationals scored 5 within the prime of the inning, the final of these on a CJ Abrams grand slam off Brooks Raley.
But the Mets got here again. They nonetheless try this. Pete Alonso tied the sport with an RBI double, and Jeff McNeil lastly put his staff forward with a triple off the right-field wall earlier than David Robertson pitched a three-up, three-down ninth.
“May not have been sexy,” Buck Showalter mentioned later. “But it was our best and most needed win.”
On the identical evening, the Braves noticed the Marlins rally with 5 runs within the prime of the ninth, gorgeous Atlanta with what turned a 5-4 victory. So, the Marlins completed off the comeback in Atlanta that the Nationals couldn’t fairly end off in New York.
Showalter was involved — coming residence from final weekend’s sequence towards the Giants in San Francisco and understanding the Braves had been coming to city this weekend — in regards to the Nationals being a lure sequence for his staff. It is strictly what Mets vs. Nationals turned. But the Mets didn’t get swept on the very finish, and Thursday evening’s recreation turned very a lot an announcement recreation for them. They’d a lot fairly make an announcement — even with a pitching workers nonetheless diminished by accidents — towards the Braves, beginning Friday evening.
“This was the kind of baseball we’re capable of playing,” McNeil, who stayed sizzling even by means of the Mets’ stoop, mentioned of his staff’s comeback. “Hopefully, it will give us some momentum going into the Braves.”
“There are a lot of winners on this team,” Joey Lucchesi, Thursday evening’s Mets starter, mentioned.
Lucchesi, making his second begin since getting back from Tommy John surgical procedure, pitched properly sufficient to get a victory after throwing seven shutout innings towards the Giants final week. The Mets had been forward, 4-1, when the sixth inning began. But the highest of the sixth ended with the Mets’ lead down to at least one run, after which the evening appeared to come back crashing down after Abrams’ slam and it appeared as if the Mets would lose once more.
Francisco Lindor got here out of his stoop with three RBIs, and Alonso got here out of his with two. Brandon Nimmo scored two extra runs and acquired two extra hits, elevating his common to .341. McNeil had what turned out to be the game-winner. And one of many Mets’ prized children, third baseman Brett Baty, had his greatest recreation of the season with three hits, together with a house run.
“Everybody stepped up tonight,” Baty mentioned.
The Mets stopped hitting once they acquired again to New York. That modified in a giant means Thursday. Even Starling Marte, who has struggled, acquired successful — hit the ball laborious — and scored the tying run within the eighth, when Alonso knocked him residence.
On the identical evening when the Braves didn’t sweep the Marlins, the Mets didn’t get swept by the Nationals. Preliminaries are over. We get the primary massive Mets-Braves sequence of the early season now. The Mets beat up on the Braves early final season. The Braves acquired them late, and so they ended up profitable the East for the fifth straight time.
So a lot has modified for the Mets these days. Steve Cohen is the proprietor, and Buck is the supervisor. Lindor got here to New York, so did Scherzer, now Verlander. But the story with the Braves nonetheless hasn’t modified. The ending is at all times the identical. The Mets look to start out altering that Friday evening. In so some ways, it feels as if the race within the East begins now.
