All season, the Mets‘ starting rotation has been a reminder of how difficult it is to get big league hitters out.
Nolan McLean never got that memo.
In only his third start on a major league mound, and in yet another crucial rivalry game in the middle of a playoff chase, the rookie righty absolutely suffocated the Philadelphia Phillies in a 6-0 win on Wednesday night at Citi Field. The Mets completed the sweep of the NL East rivals, handing them their 10th straight loss at Citi Field.
McLean became the first rookie pitcher in Mets history to win all three of his first decisions in what was quite possibly one of the most impressive starting pitching performances of the team’s season.
“All I can say is wow,” said manager Carlos Mendoza. “Super impressive. He dominated one of the better lineups in the league and he made it look easy.”
It’s not just the myriad of weapons McLean possesses that makes him so effective, it’s how he uses them and when, and his execution. The 24-year-old right-hander allowed only four hits and rarely even worked into three-ball counts, facing only one over the minimum through seven innings. There was no intimidation factor when it came to facing MVP-caliber hitters like Kyle Schwarber and Bryce Harper. McLean displayed the confidence and poise of a veteran far beyond his years.
“He has ice in his veins,” said third baseman Mark Vientos. “He’s cool when the moment is tight and hot. I think that that shows a lot about him.”
But make no mistake, the weapons are deadly.
“He can backdoor the sweeper pretty well and pretty consistently,” said catcher Hayden Senger. “He can front-hip the two-seam, he can go changeup off the two-seam, you can go sweeper off the two-seam. It’s like he’s got a lot of options and I can call a lot of different pitches.”
The only hope the NL East leaders had was to get to the bullpen, but McLean worked so quickly and efficiently that he only needed 75 pitches to get through seven innings, and 95 to get through eight.
Hope was gone for Philadelphia long before he went back out for the eighth inning, but any they had left was fleeting. By that point, they were already down 6-0, thanks to a two-run home run by Vientos in the bottom of the seventh, his sixth in his last 10 games.
“I knew about the lineup going into it — I was going to have my hands full and was going to have to have some good stuff,” McLean said. “Top to bottom, they’re stacked with hitters, so I definitely know I needed to bring some good stuff tonight.”
He sure brought it.
The loss for the Phillies (76-57) cut the division lead over the Mets (72-61) to only 4.0 games. The two will play a four-game series at Citizens Bank Park starting Sept. 8, which could determine the winner of the NL east. The Mets maintain the third NL Wild Card spot behind the San Diego Padres and Chicago Cubs.
“We’ve got, I don’t know how many games left, but every game counts,” Mendoza said. “That’s that’s our mentality right now coming here — we’ve got to take care of business.”
The Mets opened the third inning with five straight singles off right-hander Taijuan Walker to go up 3-0. They pushed one more across in the fifth with two outs, spelling the end for the former Mets starter. Walker gave up four earned runs on 10 hits, walked one and struck out three (4-7).
Brandon Nimmo, the walk-off hero for the Mets one night prior, had a three-hit night, Brett Baty with 2-for-4 with a double and Vientos extended his season-long hitting streak to 10 games with an RBI single in the fifth. His home run off left-hander Tanner Banks in the seventh, No. 13 on the year, gave him three RBI.
“We’ve been taking at-bats very seriously,” Vientos said. “Every at-bat, no matter the score. It’s important. I think you want to be locked in every single at-bat. Sometimes, depending on the score and depending on how the game is going, we lose focus. But I think the past couple games we’ve been playing, we’ve been locked in.”
But the real star was McLean.
A two-out single by Harper in the seventh brought up catcher J.T. Realmuto, who got ahead 3-0. Mclean battled back to work the count full. He threw a sweeper on the sixth pitch, and Realmuto popped it straight up.
The Phillies had runners on the corners in the top of the eighth after McLean gave up back-to-back singles to start the inning, prompting pitching coach Jeremy Hefner to come out to the mound to buy him some time to talk to Senger.
“I made some good pitches,” McLean said. “They were able to put the bat to it anyway, so it wasn’t necessarily like a lack of execution, just sometimes good offense beats good pitching.”
He retired the next three in order.
McLean’s final line: 8.0 scoreless innings, no walks and six strikeouts.
“Obviously, the hitters here are the best in the world, and I know that,” McLean said. “But I also know I have good stuff, and if I go out there and execute, I can get a lot of guys out as well.”
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