Just Mets

For tenth consecutive time the Mets won on Wednesday, defeating the Atlanta Braves by the score of 3-2 at Citi Field.Here are my takeaways from tonight’s game…

A flat start, and an entertaining finish.

The Mets were flat pretty much for the first seven innings of this game. The offense had done nothing against Eric Stults, who at one point had retired 11 Mets in a row. But, like they’ve done all throughout this winning streak, they came alive late in the game, showed some character to claw from behind (for the seventh time this season already), and find a way to get to the Braves bullpen late. They did a lot of little things well to hang around, helping Dillon Gee on defense behind him, and executing some small ball to scratch across the go-ahead run.

As has been the case throughout this ten game winning streak, they showed a lot of character tonight. Great stuff.

Dillon Gee had a really nice outing.

He wasn’t perfect by any means, but he was solid for seven strong innings. He got lucky thanks to some outstanding defense behind him, most notably by Ruben Tejada and Juan Lagares (you can watch Lagares’ incredible catch here). But sometimes a pitcher needs some good fortunes, especially a guy like Gee who pitches to a lot of contact.

It was especially important for Gee to pitch well, with possible changes to the rotation looming and having struggled over his first two starts. He got what he needed tonight thanks to a good mixture of all of his pitches, and doing a good job not centering many of them.

Wilmer Flores is doing what he’s supposed to do.

Flores had two RBI tonight – he homered and he singled in a run. He’s 8-for-18 with three home runs and seven RBI during his five-game hitting streak now, and he’s making more contact on pitches inside the strike zone.

He looks calmer and more comfortable out there in general. His defense has improved, most notably his throws and footwork around the bag. It was a rough beginning for him over the first week of the year, but he’s starting to look like the player the Mets need him to be, and it’s fun to watch him grow and learn from his problems from earlier in the year.

Juan Lagares.

He helped produce the go-ahead run with his bat on a wonderfully executed hit-and-run in the eighth inning (extending his hitting streak to nine games in the process). But, it was his glove which might have changed the complexion of this game entirely. His catch in the seventh inning had leadoff double or triple written all over it, but somehow he made an over the shoulder/head catch running towards the center field wall.

He’s a remarkable and unique talent, and only getting better. I love watching players evolve and blossom, especially those like Lagares who wasn’t considered a meaningful prospect during the Mets rebuild process.

They struck gold. A big chunk of it.

Other notes from Wednesday:

Lucas Duda snapped an 0-for-11 skid with two hits and an RBI, which was the game winner in the eighth inning.

Michael Cuddyer took an 0-for-4, and is 0-for-8 in this series coming off a seven-game hitting streak.

Buddy Carlyle inherited two runners from Sean Gilmartin, who issued two walks to lefties, and stranded both of them in the eighth inning.

Jeurys Familia recored his league best seventh save of the year with a scoreless ninth.

The Mets ten-game winning streak is the longest such streak for the club since 2008.

The last time the Mets started 12-3 was in 1986.