CINCINNATI — The Mets’ bats are still as cold as the weather in early April, meaning they’ll need to play near-perfectly in every other aspect of the game to win.
And that’s what they did. In Friday’s game against the Reds at Great American Ball Park, the young Reds got away with mostly solid defense and especially clutch pitching, only to be further fueled by their own mistakes.
Jose Quintana was solid, the Mets bullpen limited his nervous pitching to just one run in 3¹/₃ innings, and Brett Batty had one of his best all-around games as a pro, which helped the Mets finish. Somehow I made it through that night. With only 4 hits.
The Mets (2-5) have scored 15 points in their first seven games and have continued problems offensively.
However, Jeff McNeil may have broken through with a home run in the eighth inning, and the Mets played better defense than their opponents.
The Mets’ winning run came in the seventh inning, when relief pitcher Fernando Cruz issued three walks, leaving the bases loaded with one out, giving Pete Alonso the lead.
The slugger hit a chopper up the middle that was supposed to be an inning-ending double play, but Reds shortstop Elie Delacruz couldn’t get the ball out of his glove and the toss to second base was too late.
Francisco Lindor broke a throw and Harrison Bader gave the Mets their first lead of the game.
The Reds were in crisis, but the Mets continued to pitch and defend and got out of the crisis.
In the 9th inning, the Reds got the tied runner on base on an error by Edwin Diaz, but a counterattack from Jonathan India’s check swing and a walk by Spencer Steer prevented him from reaching base.
Christian Encarnacion-Strand grounded out to Lindor, but Lindor didn’t bounce it back to McNeil and ran to second base, where he was batted out by pinch runner Bubba Thompson, giving the Mets only one out on the play. There wasn’t.
The Reds continued to score one run from Diaz, but Diaz struck out Jake Fraley to prevent the game-tying triple.
That was the theme for the Mets.
In the sixth inning, the Reds knocked Quintana out and Drew Smith came in with two on and two out. Smith guided Luke Mayle’s pop-up out of traffic.
One inning later, with two outs and two runners on, Smith replaced Brooks Lally, but Lally walked and Dela Cruz loaded the bases.
However, Larry also played like a magician, scoring an outside sweeper and forcing Delacruz, who was aiming for the winning score, out from the first inning.
Adam Ottavino and Diaz covered one of Batty’s best games for the Mets, covering the eighth and ninth innings, respectively.
As a batter, the clean-up hitter went 2-for-4 with two singles and collected half of the Mets’ hits.
But his glove was stronger than his bat, which was a persistent question for the 24-year-old.
Baty twice relieved Quintana, first in the fifth inning of a tied game.
With two outs and no outs, Steer hit Quintana’s curveball, which looked like it would be an extra-base hit that would score at least one point.
But Batty, a unique 6-foot-3 third baseman, used all of his height to send liners flying through the air. After Quintana escaped the inning, an energetic Batty applauded as he entered the dugout.
After one inning, Batty showed off his mobility.
Dela Cruz hit a soft ground ball to left, so Batty cut in front of Lindor, grabbed it and quickly fired it to first base just past the fleet-footed young star.
The Mets could do little against fireball Hunter Greene, allowing just one run on Lindor’s sacrifice fly in the fifth inning.
