Nothing is settled in April, but it’s always better to be on top. Just ask Matt Harvey and the New York Mets.
After defeating the Washington Nationals, 4-0, Friday night, the Mets are 16-8 and 4.5 games up in the National League East.
Washington, meanwhile, is mired under .500 and in fourth place. It is still one of baseball’s most talented teams and will almost surely catch fire at some point. On Thursday, the Nationals drubbed the Mets, 8-2, handing the Amazin’s their first loss of the season at Citi Field.
On Friday, though, New York sent a strong, unambiguous statement to the club nearly everyone picked to run away with the division.
Not surprisingly, that message was delivered via the right arm of Matt Harvey, “the Dark Knight of Gotham,” who twirled seven shutout frames and improved his record to 5-0.
On the other side, the Nats wasted another strong effort from their ace, Max Scherzer, who racked up 10 strikeouts and carried a no-hitter into the fourth inning but absorbed the tough-luck loss.
The game was a rematch of sorts of the 2013 All-Star Game, which Harvey started for the NL and Scherzer, then with the Detroit Tigers, started for the AL.
“They got you ready for the Kentucky Derby tonight,” Mets outfielder Michael Cuddyer quipped, per MLB.com‘s Bill Ladson and Joe Trezza, “because both of those guys are horses.”
The Mets have been riding Harvey, who returned from Tommy John surgery this spring throwing like his old self. But he’s far from the only steed in New York’s stable.
Reigning NL Rookie of the Year Jacob deGrom (3.34 ERA, 29.2 IP, 23 SO) and the ageless Bartolo Colon (3.31 ERA, 32.2 IP, 25 SO) join Harvey to form a starting corps that so far has surrendered fewer runs and logged more innings than Washington’s vaunted super-rotation.
Offensively, the Mets are missing third baseman David Wright, who was hitting .333 when he landed on the disabled list with a hamstring injury April 15.
Others, though, including first baseman Lucas Duda (.321/.420/.476, 7 2B, 12 RBI) and center fielder Juan Lagares (.305/.323/.358, 13 R, 11 RBI) have stepped up to shoulder the load.
There are question marks, to be sure, as the New York Post‘s Ken Davidoff notes:
Unfortunately for the Mets, Harvey can’t play shortstop, too, as Wilmer Flores’ sixth error provided the game-turning play. But to their credit, the Mets acted proactively late Thursday night and promoted second baseman Dilson Herrera from Triple-A Las Vegas. With David Wright (strained right hamstring) out for at least another week, Herrera will start at second base, with Daniel Murphy sliding over to third base and Eric Campbell (.204/.327/.328) likely headed back to Vegas.
Because the Mets are aiming high this season, and since they honored that ambition with their first 2.5 weeks, good for them for owning it, utilizing their roster depth and trying something different.
That’s the point. The Mets aren’t a perfect team—far from it. On paper, the Nationals are better in nearly every facet of the game, and the Miami Marlins and surprising Atlanta Braves are also lurking as potential division contenders.
The wild-card picture in the NL figures to be as crowded as the subway at quitting time, with more teams in the picture than out of it.
That’s a conversation for another day, though.
For now, a team that hasn’t posted a winning record since 2008 and hasn’t been to the playoffs since 2006 is playing like it’s squarely in the hunt. For weary Mets fans acclimated to also-ran status, that’s a welcome development.
You can’t win anything in April, but you sure can raise some hopes.
All statistics current through play on May 1 and courtesy of MLB.com unless otherwise noted.
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