Nolan McLean wins his first major league start as the Mets even up the series with Seattle.
For the New York Mets, the past two months of baseball have been some combination of haunting, aggravating, torturous, and, you know, generally unfun. In a nice change of pace for a fanbase who needed it, Saturday afternoon at Citi Field was nothing more than a nice time at the ballpark or in front of the television.
The highlight of the victorious afternoon was the big league debut of Nolan McLean, a former two-way star and one of the consensus top-50 prospects in all of baseball. Joining a rotation that can kindly be described as a garbage pile since the season peaked at the start of the Summer, McLean provided one of the best starts by a Met in the entire second half. All together, in 5.1 innings of work, McLean only allowed two hits, walked four Mariners, and struck out eight on his way to a scoreless outing and a 1.000 major league winning percentage.
On the offensive side of the game, there weren’t many big headline moments, but a few sprinkled two-out hits and some historic accolades came together and gave the Mets all they needed to get a 3-1 victory over Seattle. Pete Alonso doubled in a run in the seventh for his Mets record fourth season of 100 or more runs driven in and Francisco Lindor stole second base before ultimately being thrown out and setting a major league record with his fourth 20 home run 20 stolen base season as a shortstop. One mark the Mets probably would’ve preferred not contributing to was letting Bryan Woo get through the sixth inning for his 24th consecutive start, though they had him at 100 pitches with bases loaded in the fifth before he wriggled out of it.
Following up McLean, out of the bullpen, Gregory Soto and Edwin Diaz had little issue finishing up the final 3.2 innings of the game and only giving up a single run on an Eugenio Suarez homer between them.
The Mets head out tonight to take a road trip for a home game as they make their way to Williamsport to take part in the annual Little League Classic with the stands full of Little Leaguers and their parents. It’ll be a day of Juan Soto chatting with kids, Kodai Senga showing how to throw his forkball, Pete Alonso sliding on a piece of cardboard down a hill, and, hopefully, a series win for the Mets.
SB Nation GameThreads
Box scores
Win Probability Added
Big Mets winner:Nolan McLean +27.2% WPA
Big Mets loser: Nobody!
Mets pitchers: +51.6% WPA
Mets hitters: -1.6% WPA
Teh aw3s0mest play: Francisco Lindor’s third inning RBI double, +13.9% WPA
Teh sux0rest play: Cal Raleigh’s third inning single to load the bases, -6.9% WPA
Category: General Sports
