Mets' Mark Vientos, Jeff McNeil hit two homers apiece in lopsided win over Atlanta
Mets' Jeff McNeil hits a three-run home run during the third inning against Atlanta on Saturday in Atlanta. Credit: AP/Butch Dill
ATLANTA — Atlanta has long been the Mets’ personal haunted house, a land of horrors where playoff dreams have gone to die painful, protracted deaths.
So despite their opponent’s sub-.500 record, there was every reason for the Mets to be wary of Truist Park this weekend. But a funny thing happened on the way to Cobb County: Instead of poison, they found an elixir.
Clay Holmes finally provided the starting pitching length this team so desperately needs, Jeff McNeil and Mark Vientos hit two home runs apiece, and Pete Alonso and Starling Marte also homered as the Mets beat Atlanta, 9-2, on Saturday night.
They moved 2 1⁄2 games ahead of the Reds for the final National League wild-card spot.
The Mets (69-60) have won five of their last seven and have 21 runs and 32 hits in the last two games. They scored six runs off two lefty relievers Saturday, a positive sign for a team that entered the day batting .231 against southpaws, 20th in baseball.
Holmes, utilizing all of his pitches to great effect, allowed two runs and three hits with two walks and four strikeouts in 6 1⁄3 innings. Before Nolan McLean’s sterling performance Friday, the Mets hadn’t had a starter other than David Peterson complete the sixth inning since June 7. Holmes lowered his ERA to 3.60 in his second-longest MLB start.
“It’s contagious,” manager Carlos Mendoza said. “We’ve seen how hard it’s been for us the past couple of months, but now we’re getting consistent five, six [innings] . . . [Holmes] attacked hitters, getting ground balls, using all of his pitches.”
“We’ve been playing the brand of baseball that we know we’re capable of playing,” Marte said via an interpreter. “We’ve been aggressive on the basepaths, we’re being aggressive on pitches in the zone, and when that happens, [things] click for us and we’re able to show the type of team we’re capable of being [and of] finally achieving the goal we promised [each other].”
The Mets’ big blow was their first homer: With two on and two out in the third, McNeil, who’d been held out of the starting lineup the two previous days because of shoulder soreness, obliterated Cal Quantrill’s first-pitch cutter, slamming a 420-foot second-deck shot to give the Mets a 3-0 lead.
“It was fun seeing the boys [Friday] with that game they had [collecting 21 hits],” McNeil said. “You want to get in there and contribute . . . We’re swinging the bat well and we’re not missing pitches. I think we have some good plans up there driving the ball and putting together those big innings. Those big innings are huge.”
Holmes got into trouble in the bottom of the inning, and with runners at the corners and one out, Jurickson Profar hit a 283-foot fly ball to left. Marte, lasered the ball to catcher Hayden Senger, who put down the tag on Nacho Alvarez Jr. for the out at home and an inning-ending double play.
“The defense came up huge,” Holmes said. “When a guy is going to score and he’s out at home, it’s a little extra-special. Even talking to [Marte] after, he was like, ‘Before that pitch, I was moving my arm around. I was wanting it. I was expecting it.’ I think that’s just the mentality of the guys out there.”
Atlanta scored both of its runs after loading the bases with none out in the fourth — the first on Marcell Ozuna’s sacrifice fly and the second on a dribbler off the bat of Drake Baldwin — and drew within 3-2.
Quantrill settled down after the third but had to be removed with two outs in the fifth with cramping in his calves. That opened the door for the Mets to face a creaky Atlanta bullpen, and eventually put together a four-run seventh.
Juan Soto led off that inning with a walk to bring up Alonso, who teed off on a 93.9-mph fastball down the middle, sneaking it over the rightfield wall — and just fair — for his 29th homer. The two-run shot gave him 103 RBIs.
Vientos then hit a no-doubter — a 414-foot homer off a hanging slider, also right down the heart of the plate, to put the Mets up 6-2. One out later, Marte capitalized on another mistake — a gift-wrapped 0-and-2 fastball — for a solo homer to left-center.
Vientos and McNeil went back-to-back against Austin Cox in the ninth, Vientos on a 414-foot shot to left and McNeil on 387-foot blast to center. It was Vientos’ first multi-homer game this season, the second of McNeil’s season and the fourth of his career. The inning marked the 10th time the Mets have hit back-to-back homers this season.
“I feel like we’re controlling the strike zone, making better swing decisions and picking each other up,” Mendoza said, adding that he began seeing a shift during their series against the Brewers two weeks ago. “Series after series, we’ve been facing some really good arms and I feel like, as a whole, we continue to put together some really good at-bats . . . We know we’re a good offensive team and we’ve seen that.”
And in Atlanta, of all places.
Laura Albanese is a reporter, feature writer and columnist covering local professional sports teams; she began at Newsday in 2007 as an intern.
