Livescore
In a game where you can’t just draw up a play to let your best player decide things in the big moments, the best players seem to have a knack for making sure that every time they come up in a big spot, they capitalize.
For the Mets, shortstop Francisco Lindor has been the engine powering them down the stretch to 14 wins in their last 20 games and right into the thick of the Wild Card race.
“I love that, I love that, I want those moments,” Lindor said after driving in three runs in the Mets’ 7-2 win over the Boston Red Sox on Tuesday night. A win that kept them a half-game out of the third Wild Card spot and in striking distance of the second spot.
“In April.. I think I had those moments as well, I just didn’t come through,” he said referencing his early season struggles. “And right now, I’m coming through. This is baseball, it’s a wave. I’m in a good wave right now, just ride it as long as I can.”
There is almost a feeling of inevitably around the MVP candidate.
“Every time he’s at the plate, we feel good about our chances,” manager Carlos Mendoza said. “He’s locked in right now.”
Lindor is “glad” it feels inevitable for the people outside and “that’s a good thing,” but he’s just living in the moment.
“I’m walking to the plate and I feel good, I feel good, but I’m in the moment,” he said. “I prepare when I’m on the top step and when I’m on deck, going through scenarios preparing and then once I’m in the box I just let things happen.”
After driving an RBI double the other way to start a four-run eighth inning to give the Mets some breathing room, Lindor credited the guys who got on base ahead of him – Jeff McNeil and Francisco Alvarez – with setting the table.
“Whenever I come up in those situations, it might look like I’m the guy doing it, but the guys in front of me are the ones that are actually coming up big time,” the shortstop said. “Jeff had a great at-bat in the [eighth] inning, and Alvarez had a great at-bat as well, he took a ground ball the other way.
“Now I get to come up with first and second, it’s just a matter of me following their steps. It’s a team effort, it just so happens it worked out that I’m the one getting the big hit.”
Fresh off an August in which he had 16 extra-base hits and 16 RBI while slashing .325/.372/.567 for a .939 OPS, Lindor has added five hits and five RBI in his first 11 at-bats of September. Those numbers make his .197 average and .639 OPS in his first 29 games of the season feel like a distant memory.
Lindor’s first big hit of Tuesday night, a two-run shot in the third, was the Mets’ first hit of the game two batters after McNeil walked to represent their first base runner. The towering blast gave him 30 home runs in a season for the fifth time in his big league career.
“It feels good, I haven’t really thought what it really means,” Lindor said about his 30th blast. “All I know is today we won the game and it helped to get the offense going. So I was pleased with that, happy with that. And we gotta continue to climb the mountain.”
Mendoza said it looked like it was going to be a tough night off Boston starter Kutter Crawford’s cutter and his fastball, as the right-hander racked up six strikeouts in his first eight outs.
“It was strikeout after strikeout and then McNeil with the huge walk and then Lindor coming through,” he said.
David Peterson, who tossed a career-high 11 strikeouts in the win, said the third-inning homer felt like “if we could get a guy on and get him to the plate, something special is gonna happen.”
“He’s been doing a lot. He’s had a great year. I know he’s gonna continue to do what he does. It’s special He’s been doing a lot of it lately,” the starter said. “I think you saw it was kinda contagious at the end, those runs at the end were huge for us.”
With just 23 games remaining after Tuesday’s win, Lindor said he doesn’t feel any extra bit of urgency as he’s “been feeling that [urgency] for a while.”
“For a while, we have had a sense of urgency and it’s not just me,” he said. “It’s everybody in here, even the guys that get called up they understand that we’re on a mission.”
The MVP chants came showering down after the home run and Lindor said that “if it happens, it would be a dream” to win the honor and “it would be extremely special,” but “right now I’m just trying to play winning baseball.”
“At the end of the day, I appreciate the love that the fans are giving me,” he said. “And I just gotta continue to put up a good show for them so it keeps on getting louder and louder.”
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