Catcher knocks in six in Stroman’s debut
Marcus Stroman couldn’t even finish the fifth inning, getting charged with three runs in 4.1 innings in his Met debut. And it didn’t mat- ter a lick, as the Mets beat the Pi- rates 7-5 in Pitts- burgh on Saturday night thanks to his catcher and some strong innings from the much-maligned bullpen.
The Mets (54-56) are 4.5 games out of the second wild card pending other Saturday night results.
Stroman deserves some credit, as he made a spectacular play in the field to stop the bleeding in a rough first inning that could have been so much worse. With two runs already plated and the bases loaded with one out, Kevin Newman hit a weak dribbler to the left side of the infield. Stroman, a 2017 Gold Glove winner in Toronto sprinted to his right, grabbed the ball barehanded, and gunned Starling Marte out at the plate.
The sparkling outing from the middle relievers would’ve been wasted without the Met offense bringing the team back from behind. Down 3-1 in the seventh, Jeff McNeil came off the bench — the Mets are playing 10 games in a nine-day period — and bashed a massive 415-foot solo homer completely out of the stadium.
Over the next two innings, Wilson Ramos broke the game wide open, hitting two very similar balls to deep right field. First, The Buffalo smoked a two-run homer in the eighth, putting the Mets up 4-3. Then with one out and the bases loaded in the top of the ninth, Ramos hit a double off the right field wall, clearing the bases and making Edwin Diaz’s imminent entrance much less dramatic.
Ramos ended up with four hits on the night. He also knocked in the Mets’ first run in the first inning; it was his first career six-RBI game.
Stroman did settle in eventually, retiring eight straight Pirates at one point. But he hit his soft pitch limit in the fifth, handing off two baserunners to Luis Avilan.
Avilan let in a run that was charged to Stroman, and the bullpen was stellar from there. Jacob Rhame finished that inning and the next one. Justin Wilson threw a shutout seventh inning. And Seth Lugo extended his scoreless innings streak to 13.2, throwing a perfect eighth. Lugo has been excellent since the calendar turned to July, lowering his ERA from 3.60 to 2.71 in that time. He’s allowed just one walk and three hits in that stretch, and was recognized as July’s National League Reliever of the Month earlier this weekend.
Diaz had allowed a run in each of his last three appearances, and that streak continued Saturday. After Callaway pinch-hit for Lugo in the top of the ninth, Diaz came in with a 7-3 lead. He gave up a two-run homer to Marte, Diaz’s tenth allowed after giving up just five last season.