The Mets wake up on Friday morning and as they open their Mail and look at the box scores and standings (because surely they start their day by opening their Mail and looking at the box scores and standings), they see something very nice next to their name.
They will see this: “—”
That will fall under the ‘*WGB’ column, as in ‘wild-card games back’.
And that means that as they prepare for the final miles before the All-Star break, they are in play-off position.
How long has it been since the Mets were in playoff position?
So far, the last time the Mets woke up in a playoff position, we felt pretty safe making plans for a Rangers parade in the Canyon of Heroes, and wondering how hard the Knicks would push the Celtics to join them.
“We don’t look at the scores,” Carlos Mendoza insisted Thursday afternoon. “We’re just doing business day in and day out.”
They settled the matter on Thursday.
David Peterson did just like Spider, dancing through the hail of bullets, and the Mets struck in the fifth inning, especially since MacKenzie Gore probably hasn’t been paying attention to how great Brandon Nimmo is the last few days.
Gore chose to bypass Francisco Lindor in order to go after Nimmo, and it turned out to be as unwise as any of the choices Rusty Sabich has made so far in “Presumed Innocent.”
Nimmo hit a three-run double to make it 5-0 and the game ended 7-0. It was the Mets’ first shutout in their 92nd game.
“I’m swinging a good bat now,” Nimmo said, “and when they want to throw to you in a situation like that and you hit it, it’s just a great feeling.”
So the Mets joined the idle Padres in the third wild-card position (and since they’re 3-0 against them so far this season, you can put them a half-line higher) and moved a game behind the idle Cardinals for the second wild-card position. That’s something to think about for another 24 hours, until they have to do it again.
But what’s far more encouraging — and far more important — is the quality of baseball the Mets have played over the past month, the best extended stretch since just before things went wrong for them two years ago in early September.
Yes, the bullpen remains a concern and needs to be improved.
But David Stearns’ initial deal in July, acquiring Phil Maton, paid immediate dividends as he recorded a smooth 1-2-3 seventh base hit on just 10 pitches.
Adam Ottavino tried his best to see if seven runs wouldn’t be enough to make the game officially Ottavino-proof in the ninth inning by loading the bases. But he looked as sharp as he’d been in weeks as he got out of trouble by striking out three lefties.
(And good for Nimmo, who said afterward, “We want to be buyers by the end of this month.”)
But the lineup starts to look very muscular from 1 to 9, and that’s without counting Pete Alonso’s bi-weekly power blitz that he normally does well at least once a season.
The rotation has been great and is expected to improve even more once former star player Kodai Senga returns after the break.
“A lot of passion, a lot of care, a lot of fun about this team,” Mendoza said. “How much they care about each other, how much they trust each other. That says a lot about this group.”
It also says a lot about their manager, who has had some start-up problems this year, like all managers in their first year.
But so were the Mets when they were 11-under .500 and six games out of the playoffs. Now he’s two-over and in the bracket.
That resonates in a clubhouse.
The Mets still have three games against the Rockies and four games against the Marlins behind the break, and those teams were a combined 56 games under .500 prior to Thursday.
After that, the schedule gets busier and it’s true that the Mets’ revival has largely come in the first 28 games of a 35-game series against mostly losing teams.
But we also have to remember that when they started that streak — now 19-9 — they were behind four of the National League teams they played, and they were worse than all three of the American League teams they played.
All those teams were eager to take advantage of the Mets.
Instead, it’s the Mets who wake up on Friday morning, open the newspaper and see what seemed like an impossible event just a month ago.
“—”