Mets blow 9-run lead, recover, beat Nats for 6th win in row

WASHINGTON — Francisco Lindor hit a two-run homer in the ninth inning and the New York Mets, after blowing a nine-run lead, extended their winning streak to six by beating the Washington Nationals 11-9 Saturday to open a split doubleheader on Saturday.

Ahead 9-0 in the fourth, the Mets saw the Nationals force extra innings on Andrew Stevenson’s twoout, two-run homer in the seventh that made it 9-all.

Mets reliever Trevor May (7-2) escaped a basesloaded, one-out jam in the eighth. Lindor then led off the ninth with his 12th homer, connecting against closer Kyle Finnegan (4-6) to also score the automatic runner from second.

Heath Hembree pitched the ninth to record his ninth save. Washington lost its seventh in a row.

The Mets have never blown a lead of more than eight runs in a loss, and barely avoided doing it this time.

New York began the day four games behind Atlanta in the NL East and four games back of Cincinnati for the second wild-card spot

The Mets squandered a 2-0 lead in the bottom of the ninth Friday night before recovering to win 6-2 in the 10th.

Michael Conforto’s 11th homer pushed the Mets in front 9-0 in the fourth.

Carter Kieboom hit a one-out double in the seventh ahead of Stevenson’s tying homer off Seth Lugo to tie it.

The Nationals scored three times in the fourth. Alcides Escobar hit a tworun double to highlight a four-run sixth that made it 9-7.

Javier Baez hit his 27th homer as part of a four-run second. Two errors by Escobar at shortstop and a failure to cover first base helped the Mets pad their 6-0 lead by the time the inning was over.

Nationals manager Dave Martinez was ejected in the second. He argued with umpires following a checkswing ruling in favor of Pete Alonso, leading to a walk.

Martinez, who had ankle surgery Thursday morning, was ejected while yelling from a dugout bench. He needed to gather his crutches and use them to exit the dugout after being tossed.

Mets starter Marcus Stroman pitched five innings, allowed six hits, three earned runs and struck out two.

Washington starter Erick Fedde allowed three consecutive singles to open the game. Jonathan Villar and Brandon Nimmo eventually scored to give the Mets an early 2-0 lead. Nimmo left the game after the top of the second inning because of right hamstring tightness.