Even before Jenrry Mejia was suspended for 80 games, the Mets had eyes on Jeurys Familia to be the team’s closer in his absence.
“If Jeurys is throwing the ball good, we’ll leave him there right now,” Terry Collins said of Familia over the weekend.
With that said, it would appear Collins isn’t quite ready to give the job to Familia entirely – he used Jerry Blevins in the ninth inning on Sunday against A.J. Pierzynski, and he grounded out for the first out of the inning.
Then, Collins installed Familia, who got the final two outs and recorded his first save of the year.
“Winning games is more important to me than saves. If that helps us that’s what I’m going to do,” Collins said of the Blevins/Familia combination he used in the ninth inning.
It’s not necessarily the worst idea in the world, at least for now. And, wins are in fact the most important statistic they can record. Familia hasn’t been dominant against left-handed hitters – they’ve hit .294 with 14 extra-base hits (including four home runs) against him in his career.
Meanwhile, Blevins has proven to be very effective against lefties in his career, so if there’s a big spot for him against a lefty in the ninth inning – such as yesterday in a one run game – it makes a ton of sense to use him, especially with the Mets carrying three left-handers and eight relievers overall in the bullpen.
Blevins has retired all five left-handers he’s faced, striking out three of them. He’s held lefties to a .210 average and a .589 OPS in his career.
Just Mets 