MAGIC JUAN!
Mets put on show in 8th as Lagares clears bases & Rajai hits first HR to give Amazin’s chance to sweep
Rajai Davis settled into the Mets clubhouse and placed his belongings inside his locker mere hours before his game-changing eighth-inning at-bat. When the veteran outfielder woke up in Syracuse on Wednesday morning, Davis had no idea he’d end up at Citi Field and piggyback Juan Lagares’ bases-clearing goahead double in a big-league way.
Davis slammed a three-run homer on a bullet to left field as the Mets pulled away for a 6-1 lead over the Nationals on Wednesday night at Citi Field. He became the 11th player in
Mets franchise history to hit a home run in his first at-bat. Robinson Cano also accomplished that feat on Opening Day.
Davis’ homer was the punctuation mark on Lagares’ RBI double earlier in the eighth inning that gave the Mets a 3-1 lead. Hitting seventh and ninth in the lineup, Lagares and Davis were respectively the least likely of the order to punish the Nationals.
The Mets selected Davis’ contract from Triple-A Syracuse just over an hour before a superb pitching duel between Jacob deGrom and Max Scherzer transpired. Davis only ended up with the Mets after Brandon Nimmo hit the injured list with inflammation in his neck and the team was scrounging for outfielders. Davis reached Citi Field in the third inning Wednesday.
“Raj is a winning player,” Mets manager Mickey Callaway said after reuniting with Davis, as they spent the 2016 season together with the Indians. “He’s infectious to everybody around him. That’s evident when you’ve been on his team, it was evident in spring training in that clubhouse. Everybody loves Raj. He’s the man.”
Portraying a com- petitive battle between former Cy Young winners, deGrom and Scherzer lived up to the hype and dominated their rival lineups to put on a show for the Citi Field crowd.
DeGrom struck out eight batters and allowed just two hits, one being a home run, over six strong innings during the third consecutive Mets win over the Nationals. New York looks for the sweep behind Steven Matz against Stephen Strasburg on Thursday.
The ace’s only blemish arrived on his fourth pitch of the night. deGrom served up a 96-mph fastball to the inside corner of the plate that left-handed hitter Adam Eaton punished for a solo homer to right.
DeGrom eased out of the first inning on 11 pitches, but that one run was all the Na
tionals would get in the game.
The 30-year-old righthander was unhinged in the sixth inning of the game. DeGrom recorded his sixth strikeout of the night and then walked two straight batters. His pitch count creeped into the high 90’s as he struggled to get out of the inning.
Then, as if he found a cheat sheet to maneuver through the Nationals lineup, deGrom struck out the next two batters to end the sixth inning on 103 pitches for his final frame of the game.
“I had to refocus and bare down in that situation and was fortunate enough that I was able to do it,” deGrom said.
Davis journeyed on a twohour Uber ride from Allentown, PA to Flushing on Wednesday. He found out he was going to the big leagues around 5 p.m. before greeting his teammates and slapping hands in the dugout in the third inning. He even got lost and couldn’t find the Mets clubhouse.
“It was a normal day when it started,” Davis said. “And then we took batting practice in Lehigh Valley in the cage. Then I found out I was coming up. I thought the manager was playing around, playing a little joke. But, I’m here.”