Baseball is a funny sport sometimes. Had a logical person looked at the pitching matchups for this series, they would have reasonably guessed the Mets would have had an advantage and a high likelihood of winning Monday and Tuesday while giving the Mets no shot in the Tylor Megill vs. Garrett Crochet matchup. And yet, the Mets earned their lone win of the series on Wednesday in that lopsided matchup, picking up a 5-1 win against the Red Sox to salvage the series finale and conclude a 2-4 road trip.
To be clear, the Mets didn’t hit well against Crochet. They were stymied for much of the night against the potential AL Cy Young candidate, and like Monday and Tuesday, they had many opportunities to capitalize. In the first, Francisco Lindor led off with a double and was promptly stranded there as Starling Marte—hitting in the two-spot for the first time this season—popped out to short, and Juan Soto and Pete Alonso were called out on strikes. Meanwhile in the bottom half of the frame, Megill retired the side in order without breaking much of a sweat.
The Mets got a run in the second, as the team got a much-needed hit with a runner in scoring position (though they almost failed again). The inning began with Crochet issuing a walk to Vientos, and Luis Torrens doubled off the Green Monster to put runners on second and third. Tyrone Taylor and Luisangel Acuña failed to bring either runner across, but Brett Baty singled Vientos home for the first run of the game. However, Torrens was gunned down at home to end the inning.
Megill, to his credit, cruised into the fifth inning and looked better than he has in any of his May starts. He picked up a pair of strikeouts in the second and third and struck out the side in the fourth while working around a second inning double and a two-out single in the third. He rain into a lot of trouble in the fifth, however, and could not escape the frame. The inning began with a single from Nick Sogard. After Trevor Story was retired, Carlos Narváez singled and Ceddanne Rafaela was hit by a pitch. Jarren Duran strode to the plate and roped a Megill pitch deep to right field, just missing a grand slam and settling for a game-tying sacrifice fly. Megill was removed at that point, have allowed one run and struck out 10 batters in an encouraging start, despite only lasting 4 2⁄3 innings.
An uneventful sixth inning on both sides led to the Mets’ biggest inning of the road trip, as they pushed three runs across against Boston’s bullpen to take the lead for good. With Liam Hendricks in the game, Torrens and Taylor singled to put a runner in scoring position immediately. After Acuña failed to get a bunt down, he hit a slow grounder to short and beat out an infield single—it was initially called an out but overturned upon replay. Alex Cora turned to Brennan Bernardino to clean up Hendricks’ mess, but Baty came through again with RISP as he hit an opposite field single off the Monster to plate two. The Mets eventually loaded the bases again, and Soto drove home the third run of the inning on a deep fly ball to center field.
The Mets’ bullpen went to work from there and kept the Red Sox bats in check. Huascar Brazobán, who replaced Megill, went 2 1⁄3 innings and struck out four while allowing just one hit and not issuing a walk. Brazobán has been one of the unsung heroes for the Mets and concluded his strong outing by striking out the side in the seventh. In the eighth, Reed Garrett worked around a one-out single from Rafael Devers, with the highlight coming when he struck out Alex Bregman to hand the superstar the first Golden Sombrero of his career.
The Mets got a much-needed insurance run in the top of the ninth, as Lindor struck a long fly ball off the light tower above the Monster for his tenth homer of the season. Gary Cohen provided a great stat about the Mets having a 23-game winning streak (now 24 games) when Lindor homers. The dinger gave Lindor his 120th homer as a Met, which tied him for 12th on the franchise list. It was also the club’s first homer in 217 at-bats, a streak spanning six games. In any event, this took the save situation away from Edwin Díaz, and true to form, he struggled with the extra breathing room. He issued a leadoff walk to Kristian Campbell but recovered to strike out Sogard—the team’s 16th strike out of the evening—and get Story to fly out. Díaz shut the door by getting Narváez to ground out to second.
The Mets are off on Thursday before returning home to face Shohei Ohtani and the Dodgers on Friday. Griffin Canning will take the hill opposite Clayton Kershaw. The first game will air on Apple TV+, with the second and third games airing on FOX and ESPN, respectively.
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Box scores
Win Probability Added
Big Mets winner: Huascar Brazobán, 23.2% WPA
Big Mets loser: Starling Marte, -9.0% WPA
Mets pitchers: 37.4% WPA
Mets hitters: 12.6% WPA
Teh aw3s0mest play: Brett Baty two-run single in the seventh, +12.0% WPA?
Teh sux0rest play: Ceddanne Rafaela hit by pitch in the fifth to load the bases, -8.5% WPA
