The Mets played spoiler in the Miami Marlins' hopes for a postseason-berth with three two-run home runs to win the first game of Wednesday’s doubleheader, 11-2.
New York improved to 72-85 on the year and Miami fell to 81-76 and 1.0 game behind the Chicago Cubs for the final Wild Card spot.
Here are the takeaways…
- After taking a 2-2 pitch just below the zone, Pete Alonso smacked a full-count slider that got too much of the plate 416 feet to left field for a two-run home run to open the scoring with one out in the top of the first inning off Miami left-hander Braxton Garrett.
Alonso muscled a single to center his second time up and came around to score on a two-run dinger from Francisco Lindor to make it 4-0 in the bottom of the third. The homer, 384 feet to the gap in left-center (108.1 mph off the bat), was the shortstop’s 28th of the season.
The Polar Bear got jammed in his third at-bat but softly lined it over the bag at first for a double to start the sixth. He would come around to score on a two-run shot to center by Mark Vientos. The 424-foot blast (109.3 mph) was Vientos' ninth of the year and made it 6-0.
Alonso wasn’t done ripping a single to left in the seventh after Brandon Nimmo's two-out bloop single extended his hitting streak to eight games and Ronny Mauricio hustled for an infield single. Lindor would plate a pair with a single up the middle to give him four RBI on the day.
Alonso entered Game 1 mired in a 3-for-38 slump and hitless in his last 12 at-bats. He ended the day 4-for-4 with four runs scored and two RBI and collected his first big fly (114.6 mph) in nearly a fortnight. He was plunked on a 1-2 pitch in the eighth.
- Joey Lucchesi got the start in the late-afternoon start of the twin bill at Citi Field. In the battle of Southpaws, both starters were hit hard early, but the Mets’ lefty escaped damage early on.
Lucchesi did allow a double in the second (106.2 mph off the bat), two flyouts to the edge of the warning track in the third (105.2 and 104.2 mph) and Jake Burger smoked a single up the middle (111.1 mph) after just missing what woulda been a deep homer that hooked foul in the fourth. But it was four scoreless innings for Lucchesi on 53 pitches.
Ironically, Lucchesi ran into trouble for the first time of the game when Jazz Chisholm Jr. bunted (38.0 mph off the bat) for a single, moved to second on a balk before Garrett Hamson drew his second walk of the game to put two on and two out in the fifth. But a soft fly ball to right ended the threat. Back-to-back singles put two on with two out in the sixth, but Yuli Gurriel popped out in foul ground on the first pitch he saw and Lucchesi had six scoreless innings under his belt.
However, back-to-back doubles by Chisholm and Nick Fortes started the seventh got Miami on the board, and Buck Showalter removed Lucchesi for right-hander Trevor Gott, who limited the damage to just one additional run despite putting several on base.
Lucchesi was charged with two runs on seven hits and three walks with three strikeouts on 91 pitches (56 strikes) and lowered his ERA to 2.89 on the season.
- Jeff McNeil got the start in right field and made a fine play diving and taking up a chunk of turf with him in the first inning. The ball kept finding McNeil as he recorded four putouts through the first nine outs of the game.
And that trend continued as McNeil would make a fine play on a running grab to rob Hampson of extra bases with a runner on and nobody out in the seventh. However, on the very next play, McNeil dropped a liner and was charged with an error.
McNeil made an ambitious dive but came up about two feet short of catching a soft liner off Jon Berti's bat that ended up a triple. He finished the day recording seven of the 27 outs with the Marlins’ Jorge Soler accounting for three of the outs and the error.
- Brett Baty started the eighth with a double and Tim Locastro was hit by a pitch to put two on to start the eighth inning and both would score on Nimmo’s double off the first base bag to make it 11-2.
- Alonso's home run, his 46th in 2023, tied him with Howard Johnson for fourth-most in franchise history with 192.
- Francisco Alvarez, who the Mets have been playing a bit sparingly the last few weeks as they look to ease him to the finish line of his rookie season, entered the game riding an 0-for-16 skid and was unable to snap out of his funk going 0-for-3 with a walk and two strikeouts.
- Garrett, the Marlins starter, entered the game with just 18 home runs (1.0 per nine innings) and 27 walks (1.6 per nine) surrendered over 155.2 innings on the season. So, of course, in four innings Wednesday, the 25-year-old allowed a pair of walks and two homers.