The New York Mets ended their five game losing streak with a 9-2 win over the Colorado Rockies on Saturday afternoon. They finally found some offense and quickly went to work on Rockies’ starter Jeff Francis, jumping out to a five run lead in the first inning. When all was said and done the Mets would score 9 runs off 12 hits. The Mets found the spark that has been missing during their losing streak; maybe it was the fact that they jumped out to a 5-0 lead. However, I think the excitement of seeing rookie Nick Evans make his major league debut going 3-4 with three doubles and two RBI helped a little bit too. Evans was called up from AA Binghamton where he has played in 43 games, hitting .296 with 31 RBI. Evan’s offensive production marked only the second time in the last 58 years that a Mets rookie went 3-3 in this major league debut; the last Met to do that was Kaz Matsui.
Every Mets starter had a hit in Saturday’s game; David Wright and Carlos Delgado both hit homeruns, for Delgado this was his third homerun in as many games. Carlos Beltran had three RBI that came off a double in the first. The Mets had three stolen bases in the game, one each for Wright, Luis Castillo, and Jose Reyes. The offense looked good, and it was great to see them jump out to a lead like that. The Mets needed this win in the worst way. And, although they have been in this slump, they are still just four games out of first place. You can only hope that yesterday’s win the first step in the right direction. But again, you can never tell with this team, one can only imagine what will happen when they take the field today.
Claudio Vargas pitching on just three days rest did a great job for the Mets. He pitched 7 innings giving up two runs on four hits, it was a great outing and the Mets really needed a good pitching performance. Duaner Sanchez retired the side in order in the bottom of the eighth and Pedro Feliciano worked a scoreless ninth to close out the game.
All in all, the Mets had a much better game. The offense was alive early on and they got a good pitching performance from Vargas. However, consistency is the key and they have yet to find any consistency other than playing poorly.
John Maine will pitch for the Mets in the rubber game of the series and the Rockies will send Aaron Cook to the hill. First pitch is scheduled for 3:05 p.m.
