Mets keep season alive with win, Clay Holmes delivers clutch performance and Pete Alonso homers
The Mets' Pete Alonso, right, celebrates with Francisco Lindor after hitting a solo home run during the third inning against the Marlins on Saturday in Miami. Credit: AP/Lynne Sladky
MIAMI — Clay Holmes knows this role, but maybe not in this way.
He amassed 74 saves in three seasons with the Yankees and did it the dangerous way — never possessing the wipeout stuff that’s typical of the closers of this era but instead enticing hitters with sweepers and sinkers that they’d batter into the ground for outs.
On Saturday, he was asked for one more save: Save the bullpen, save the Mets, and maybe, just maybe, save the season.
Holmes, Pete Alonso and a trio of relievers combined to defeat the Marlins, 5-0, at loanDepot park — and now their season remains alive another day.
The Mets (83-78) and Reds (83-78) are tied entering the final day of the season, and Cincinnati holds the tiebreaker. If the Mets lose Sunday, their season is over regardless of what the Reds do. Even if the Mets win, if the Reds also win, the Mets will not reach the postseason.
“That was phenomenal,” Alonso said of Holmes. “He gave what everyone needed . . . That just sets the tone. We’re really thankful to have him. That was very selfless, very gutsy. It shows the type of character — not just a ballplayer but a person he is.”
The Mets got most of their offense from Alonso, who drove in two runs and scored the third. The suddenly shutdown bullpen did just that, with Brooks Raley, Tyler Rogers and Edwin Diaz allowing only one baserunner on Diaz’s hit batsman.
Holmes, who despite his trials has been the most consistent member of the rotation since the season began, lived up to that role and more, cobbling together an effort that had echoes of the John Maine performance that nearly saved the Mets from oblivion during their eventual 2007 collapse.
It wasn’t a complete-game one-hitter, but like the Maine game, it was against a pesky Marlins team known for crushing the Mets’ hopes. Like Maine, Holmes has never been the flashiest or the most imposing. And like Maine that day, appearances can be deceiving. Kind of like a good sinker, which Holmes had (a pretty good cutter, too).
Holmes allowed one hit, and though he gave up three walks, he allowed only two baserunners to reach scoring position. He struck out two, hammering that sinker-sweeper combination in a way that produced 11 ground-ball outs.
Given that Holmes pitched in relief Wednesday, Mendoza expected him to go five. Holmes gave them six. “It’s a must-win game,” he said. “Going into the game, to be honest, it took me back . . . last year and losing the World Series [with the Yankees] and how bad I want to be a part of that, especially with this group here.”
It was enough to stave off what has the potential to be the greatest collapse in franchise history.
The one-time best team in baseball, the one that had a 5 1⁄2-game lead in the NL East on June 12, has gone 38-54 since then.
The Mets scored a run off Eury Perez in the first as Francisco Lindor led off with a walk, moved to second on a wild pitch and scored on Alonso’s one-out double to the gap in left-center. Brandon Nimmo blooped a single to right and stole second to put two runners in scoring position, but the Mets, who went 1-for-10 with runners in scoring position Friday, again were stung by their situational hitting. Starling Marte flied out to left and Jeff McNeil struck out looking.
They tacked on a run in the third on Alonso’s 38th homer — a two-out, full-count, 410-foot blast off Perez’s 100-mph fastball. It was his 126th RBI of the year, the second-most in MLB behind Kyle Schwarber’s 132 and one more than Cal Raleigh’s 125.
Alonso also contributed in the fifth, drawing a leadoff walk, advancing to second on a balk and moving to third on a groundout before scoring on McNeil’s two-out double into the rightfield corner.
“Just get it done,” Alonso said. “It doesn’t matter how, just get it done. And it’s going to be the same thing tomorrow.”
Perez allowed three runs and three hits with three walks and 11 strikeouts in 5 1/3 innings.
Lindor had an RBI single as the Mets added two insurance runs in the ninth. That was more than enough for Holmes, Raley, Rogers and Diaz — all of whom combined to put the Mets’ bullpen in halfway decent shape for an all-hands-on-deck Game 162 that will be started by Sean Manaea.
“As a starter in these games, for me, it’s like, I’ve just got to throw one shutout inning here,” Holmes said. “You know it’s a must-win game . . . and you have to go out and be your sharpest. So for me, going into today, it was a little bit of that reliever mindset.”
In the end, the trait that some thought would make Holmes a liability ended up being exactly what the Mets needed when it counted most.
Call it save No. 75.
Laura Albanese is a reporter, feature writer and columnist covering local professional sports teams; she began at Newsday in 2007 as an intern.
