All season, followers heeded the calls of the staff and the homeowners, packing Citi Discipline to see what they hoped could be successful baseball. For probably the most half, the Mets have given these followers a present at dwelling, however there was super frustration among the many fanbase over the previous few months because the Amazins’ have appeared something however.
The Mets needed to take care of an NFL Sunday, youngsters going again to high school and waning fan curiosity in a staff that misplaced eight straight coming into the collection finale towards the Texas Rangers. Those that confirmed as much as Citi Discipline on Sunday to see the third sport of a collection that has been eventful, but irritating, lastly acquired one thing to cheer about when Pete Alonso hit a walk-off bomb to provide the Mets a 5-2 win.
“He’s powerful,” supervisor Carlos Mendoza mentioned of his first baseman. “All he’s got to do is just touch it, pretty much, in those situations and the ball is going to go.”
Contemplating the truth that no Mets staff has ever had a shedding streak of 9 video games or longer and nonetheless managed to make the playoffs, they wanted this win.
“We need them all at this point,” Alonso mentioned. “Whether it’s today, tomorrow, or however many games we have left, we need as many as we can. We’ve just got to do the best we can to stack them.”
With two on and none out within the backside of the tenth, Alonso teed off on right-hander Luis Curvelo (1-1), sending a 1-1 sinker the opposite method over the appropriate area fence for his thirty fourth of the season. Ryne Stanek (4-6) pitched a scoreless high inning to maintain the sport tied at 2-2.
Nolan McLean tossed six shutout innings, holding the Rangers to solely 5 hits and two walks whereas placing out seven. The rookie right-hander now has a 1.19 ERA, the bottom in membership historical past for a participant by means of his first six begins. A 2-0 lead was intact when McLean left the sport, however the bullpen gave it away within the seventh.
Left-hander Brooks Raley put two on and acquired two outs earlier than handing the ball over to right-hander Reed Garrett to face No. 2 hitter Wyatt Langford. Garrett walked him to load the bases for Joc Pederson, who proceeded to line the second pitch he noticed from Garrett to proper area for a two-run, game-tying single.
Pushing the primary run throughout was laborious sufficient for the Mets. Francisco Alvarez doubled to start out the fifth towards left-hander Jacob Latz, and superior to 3rd on a floor ball by leadoff hitter Francisco Lindor. Juan Soto hit a grounder to Rowdy Tellez at first base. Alvarez noticed the place Tellez was taking part in, and broke for dwelling after the primary baseman tagged the bag for the second out. He slid in head-first, simply earlier than catcher Kyle Higashioka may get the tag down.
The Mets’ No. 1 catcher, Alvarez is at the moment taking part in with a damaged pinky on one hand and a sprained thumb UCL on the opposite. Sliding headfirst with the potential of additional aggravation to a kind of accidents nearly provides Mendoza a coronary heart assault, however Alvarez has no hesitation.
“Not really, no, I don’t think about it,” Alvarez mentioned. “I’m just going to play. I don’t want to think, ‘Oh, what if I hurt myself? What if something happens?’ I don’t think about that, I just play to win the game.”
It was a play that confirmed precisely how a lot Alvarez and the remainder of the staff needed to win.
“It was a hell of a read there,” Mendoza mentioned. “He wasn’t going on contact, so for him to recognize that the first baseman was playing a little deeper and kind of took a chance to step on the base, that’s when he kind of took off. An impressive slide there, you know, but I kind of played breath there. Then you see the reaction, you see the intensity, how fired up he got the guys in the dugout. That’s what you want to see.”
Brandon Nimmo made it 2-0 within the sixth with a solo dwelling run off right-hander Cole Winn, however the lead wouldn’t final.
The Rangers (79-71) lastly relinquished the momentum within the ninth.
Within the high of the inning pinch-runner Ezequiel Duran swiped second base, with Lindor protesting that he got here off the bag. The decision on the sphere stood, however the Mets acquired the final snigger, doubling Duran off third after Lindor nabbed a low liner by Josh Smith for the double play. The Mets had been fired up coming off the sphere.
“I feel like those are some of the little breaks that we were not getting, or we were on the other side of [in recent weeks],” Mendoza mentioned. “A soft line drive and we’re able to get that runner at third base. That’s what you need, that little break right there. It gets the guys going and when we got back in the dugout, the momentum kind of shifted there.”
The win was sufficient to provide the Mets (77-73) a 1/2 sport again within the NL Wild Card standings, and so they now lead the San Francisco Giants by 1.0 sport, and the Arizona Diamondbacks and Cincinnati Reds by 2.0.
Initially Revealed: September 14, 2025 at 5:00 PM EDT
