Mets left-hander Jose Quintana allowed one run on two hits while striking out six and walking two in five innings of Wednesday's 4-1 Game 4 win over the Philadelphia Phillies as New York secured the best-of-five NL Division Series.
"It was a rough game -- what a battle," Quintana told SNY's Steve Gelbs after the Mets beat the NL East champs at Citi Field and punched a ticket to the NLCS. "They are a pretty good lineup, always really hard to challenge against them, and it was amazing. That means a lot for us. ... To be around this group means a lot for me, so excited for this."
Quintana emerged as a key cog in New York's starting rotation down the stretch of the season, flipping the switch when the second half began.
"He stopped nibbling and he started attacking," manager Carlos Mendoza said. "He was in the zone, trusting the stuff, and he's going to pitch. He's going to the move the ball around, go in and up and out, change and keep hitters off balance and he went and did it. He was just getting behind, walking a lot of people, and he just said, 'Screw it, I'm going to go after people,' and just went with it and fixed it."
Quintana set a tone early in the game keeping the Phillies off balance by changing speeds and using their aggressiveness against them allowing him to get strikes on pitches outside the zone.
In the first, he got Kyle Schwarber to foul off back-to-back pitches at 91 mph before getting Philly's DH to wave at a 78 mph slurve off the outside corner. He did the reverse to Trea Turner, tossing a 79 mph curveball at his backfoot for a swinging strike before tying him up looking at a 92 mph 4-seem fastball at the top of the zone.
And against Bryce Harper, with the count at 1-2, he went back-to-back 78 mph slurves before throwing a hard 86 mph changeup in the dirt that got the slugger on a half swing.
He made just two mistakes on the night. First, in the fourth inning, Quintana left a fastball up in the zone that Nick Castellanos smacked for a first-pitch double that set up the Phillies' only run. And on the last batter he faced, he left a 2-1 slurve over the middle of the plate that Harper hit for a double to right.
After allowing four hits while striking out five and walking one in six scoreless innings of New York's 4-2 Game 3 Wild Card Series win at the Milwaukee Brewers last Thursday, Quintana came through again.
"This round was impressive for us," Quintana said. "We always trust in the group we have here. We navigated for a lot of months to be here, and I'm so excited -- we celebrate together and enjoy this moment."