The coldest homestand in memory hasn’t cooled off the red-hot New York Mets.
The Mets will look to complete a second straight sweep Wednesday afternoon, when they host the Miami Marlins in the finale of a three-game series.
Tylor Megill (2-0, 0.87 ERA) is slated to start for the Mets against fellow right-hander Max Meyer (0-1, 3.09).
The Mets earned their sixth straight win Tuesday afternoon, when Pete Alonso continued his early-season surge by collecting four RBIs in a 10-5 victory.
The 10 runs tied a season high for the Mets, who scored just 18 runs in their previous five wins — a span in which their pitchers allowed just eight runs while limiting the Marlins and Toronto Blue Jays to a .222 average.
New York warmed up on offense Tuesday despite the most challenging conditions yet on a frigid homestand in which the average first-pitch temperature has been 50 degrees.
The 43-degree first-pitch temperature Tuesday was accompanied by 19 mph winds blowing from left to right and wind chills in the mid-30s. The game started at 4:10 p.m., three hours earlier than its scheduled time, because the forecast for later in the evening was even chillier.
After the Marlins took a 2-0 lead in the top of the first, New York leadoff man Francisco Lindor homered on the fifth pitch he saw from Connor Gillispie to begin a 13-hit attack by the Mets. Every starter had at least one hit except Tyrone Taylor.
“This could have been a really easy game to kind of just go through the motions, make excuses, but we didn’t do that,” said Alonso, who had a wind-aided RBI double in the third inning and a three-run double in the sixth to give him seven RBIs on the homestand and 15 RBIs overall.
“I think that was a huge statement game for us.”
The loss was the fourth in the past five games for the Marlins, who displayed their inconsistency on Tuesday.
Miami, which scored just four runs while being shut out twice in its previous three games, matched a season high in runs scored. But the Marlins also allowed 10 runs for the third time and committed at least one error for the sixth time in 11 games.
An error by first baseman Matt Mervis on Lindor’s fifth-inning grounder led to three unearned runs as the Mets took the lead for good on two-RBI hits by Brandon Nimmo and Starling Marte.
Yet center fielder Derek Hill saved the Marlins from a more lopsided defeat. In the sixth, with two outs and the bases loaded, he ranged back more than 100 feet to make a diving catch on the warning track and rob Taylor of an extra-base hit.
“The wind today was definitely wild,” said Hill, who also homered in the top of the sixth. “There were a couple balls that died going into the gap. A couple of balls that took off. It was an interesting day out there, for sure.”
Megill earned a win on Friday, when he allowed two hits over 5 1/3 innings in the Mets’ 5-0 victory over the Blue Jays. Meyer took a loss the same day after giving up three runs over six innings as the Marlins fell 10-0 to the Atlanta Braves.
Megill is 2-2 with a 3.74 ERA in five career games (four starts) against the Marlins. Meyer lost his lone previous start and appearance against the Mets last Aug. 17, when he surrendered four runs on six hits over four innings in New York’s 4-0 win.
–Field Level Media
