The Mets may be too far gone in the standings to turn this into some grand rescue act, but for two straight days at Citi Field, they found something they’d been missing for most of the year: actual joy.
Saturday brought another one of those nights, a 5-4 walk-off win over the Nationals that felt less like a routine victory and more like a release. The Mets erased the game with a two-run ninth, got clutch at-bats from Jorge Polanco and Francisco Alvarez, then watched Francisco Lindor drive in the winner with a single that landed like a long exhale.
Lindor, who had already committed a baserunning mistake and has had a rough season overall, kept moving to second even as the dugout spilled out around him. He was laughing, jumping and shouting while the celebration swirled around him.
The Mets are 55-69 and have now won eight of their last 11, taking the trade-deadline white flag and somehow turning it into something resembling a party.
“It’s just resilient,” interim manager Andy Green said. “You don’t play perfect baseball when you go on winning streaks.
You make mistakes, you make errors, you make baserunning mistakes, you don’t execute every pitch, but you don’t make that moment impact the next moment . . . I think if guys take the lesson out of this year, then yes, it can definitely impact next year.”
That’s really the story of this stretch. The Mets aren’t chasing perfection anymore, and maybe that’s the point.
For much of the season, they were trapped by expectations they couldn’t live up to. This version is stripped down, but it’s also looser, and there’s a kind of value in that.
Friday offered the first hint of it. Kodai Senga came out of the bullpen in the ninth, and even without the full production, the moment had a little electricity to it.
“I didn’t see Michael Jackson, and if you were going to ask me what his song was going to be, I wouldn’t say ‘Beat It’ ” Green said of Senga’s closer entrance. “I liked it. I think everybody did.”
Senga’s presence mattered because fans have spent most of the last two seasons wanting something to latch onto. That carried right into Saturday, when Sean Manaea gave the Mets five strong innings before running into trouble in the sixth. He finished having allowed four runs and six hits with two walks and seven strikeouts in 6 1⁄3 innings, and even after surrendering a one-run lead, he walked off to applause.
The outing still fit the larger trend. Manaea allowed just two hits through five innings before showing signs of fatigue.
He came in with a 2.16 ERA over his previous four starts and has gone at least six innings in six of his last seven outings. That’s a sharp contrast from the 6.85 ERA he posted in his first eight starts, when the questions around his deal were much louder.
Lindor’s night followed the same messy-but-meaningful pattern. He had an error Friday and homered in that game, then Saturday he singled in the eighth with the Mets trailing 4-3 before being caught stealing by a wide margin. One inning later, he won it.
The ninth itself nearly turned into a different kind of comedy. Jefry Yan thought he had Nasim Nunez struck out looking with two outs and started celebrating, only for the pitch to be ruled a ball.
Yan, who normally pats the ground at the end of his mound dance, instead patted his hand for a challenge on the way down. The call stood, the Mets burned their last challenge in a one-run game, and Yan had to reset.
“I also thought we had one challenge remaining,” a sheepish Yan said via an interpreter. “Once I lost it there, I didn’t want to look bad, so I had to lock back in, focus and try to execute my pitch again . . . I actually wanted to really celebrate, so that’s what I ended up doing.”
Nunez then took a 98.9-mph fastball for ball three before striking out swinging on an 88.9-mph slider on the black.
Polanco, who came into the day hitting .137 and was booed after striking out in the seventh, started the ninth rally with a single off closer Yovanny Cruz. From there, Alvarez tied it with a double and Lindor finished it.
Green tied the bigger picture back to the people in the room, including Manaea, Lindor and Yan. Manaea has pushed through physical limits and his own rough start.
Lindor is living through the worst season of his career. Yan spent five years out of professional baseball before finally getting his chance in the majors.
“resilience has a bit of vulnerability to it as well, [and] to acknowledge that this isn’t easy.”
That’s where the Mets are now: not in the standings, but in the moments. The wins aren’t going to become a banner at Citi Field. If there’s anything left to salvage, it’s going to come in pieces - one at-bat, one outing, one small crack of light at a time.
“It’s been a tough year for everybody here,” Lindor said. “But now [the younger players] are seeing that the year is not done.
We’ve got to play to win . . . When we were losing, they got a little bit upset because they wanted to win.
It’s very important, and not just for them, but for everybody.”
Or, as the night seemed to say in its own strange way: “No one wants to be defeated . . . You have to show them you’re not really scared.”
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