IN THE BIG INNING
Six-run 7th, brilliant Thor carry Mets to Opening Day blowout
Wilmer Flores jumps up after barely beating (he was called out before it was overturned on review) the tag from Braves catcher Tyler Flowers to score the first run in the Mets’ 6-0 win. Noah Syndergaard went six innings before leaving with a blister, which was of little concern.
Nothing says Opening Day like the Mets resembling world beaters.
In this case the victim was the rebuilding Braves, who will likely have to overachieve just to sniff the playoff race this season. But the Mets effectively handled their task Monday, executing on all fronts.
After approaching their work meekly for six innings, the Mets unloaded with six runs in the seventh and rolled to a 6-0 victory before a Citi Field sellout of 44,384.
“It was awesome out there, feeling the electricity, the atmosphere with the fans,” Noah Syndergaard said after pitching six shutout innings before departing because of a blister on his middle finger. “From the second I started walking up the dugout steps, I started to get chills, just between the roar of the crowd, it was unbelievable.”
The Mets — who had lost two of their previous three openers — improved to 36-20 on Opening Day, still easily the best mark in major league history.
Maybe the only blemish was Syndergaard’s blister, which he says popped during the game. To play it safe, Mets manager Terry Collins will push him back a day in the rotation, putting him on track for a Sunday start.
Hansel Robles, Fernando Salas and Robert Gsellman followed Syndergaard with a scoreless inning apiece. By the time Salas entered for the eighth, the Mets were coasting.
Patience was the theme of the Mets’ huge seventh inning that gave them the runs they needed. In the inning, the Mets drew four walks, f inally breaking it open on Lucas Duda’s threerun double to left-center against Eric O’Flaherty.
O’Flaherty, the lefty arsonist who was equally unspectacular in his stint with the Mets in 2015, walked Neil Walker and Jay Bruce in succession (the latter forced in a run) before Duda delivered.
“It’s a question, do you be aggressive or kind of wait [O’Flaherty] out?” Duda said. “I decided to be aggressive, and it paid off.”
Duda, who missed most of last season with a stress fracture in his back, dispatched signals in spring training that his swing had returned.
“It’s a big hit for Lucas after missing all that time last year,” Collins said. “But that’s one of the things we saw in spring training: Even though he was trying to protect himself from some of the injuries that have been caused by his willingness to work like crazy, he went back to taking some short swings to the baseball.”
Asdrubal Cabrera’s third single of the game had given the Mets their first run of the season and a 1-0 lead. Wilmer Flores was originally called out at the plate on Ender Inciarte’s throw home, but the ruling was overturned on replay.
Julio Teheran gave the Mets fits with his changeup over six scoreless innings in which he allowed only four hits and walked three, with six strikeouts. The Braves ace lowered his career ERA against the Mets to 2.21 in 16 appearances.
Syndergaard was finished after six innings in which he allowed five hits and struck out seven. The stud righthander ran his scoreless streak to 18 innings, dating to last season. Included are the seven shutout innings he pitched against the Giants in last year’s NL wild-card game.
Syndergaard battled to keep the Braves scoreless through six. That meant unleashing a changeup to strike out Matt Kemp with runners on the corners in the sixth before drawing a full count on Nick Markakis after falling behind 3-0. Markakis was then retired on a fly out, nullifying the consecutive singles by Dansby Swanson and Freddie Freeman.
Syndergaard’s f irst real challenge came in the fourth, when Freeman’s shot to right hit off the base of the wall and rolled away from Bruce for a triple. But Syndergaard didn’t waver, striking out Kemp for the second out before getting Markakis to chase a full-count slider.
“[Syndergaard] kept himself under control the whole game,”” Collins said. “Even when he got in trouble you didn’t see him panic, he just made pitches, so this kid pitches a lot older than he is and I thought he handled it real well.”