The Mets’ bullpen may not have been lights-out Friday night — it allowed two runs in three innings — but it was at least an improvement, and finally good enough to get the job done.
After being lit up in the three-game sweep at the hands of the Nationals and pitching to a bloated 10.61 ERA, the bullpen held on to get the Mets their first win of the year. John Lannan allowed two runs in two-thirds of an inning, on Jay Bruce’s two-run homer in the seventh. But Kyle Farnsworth pitched 1 ¹/₃ scoreless innings and Jose Valdere pitched a scoreless ninth.
“Really a big outing by Kyle Farnsworth to get us to the ninth inning, and Jose, one thing you know about closers is the game can always get interesting. But I’ve been told by a lot of guys this guy believes in what he does, and he challenges people to swing the bat,’’ Terry Collins said. “It was a good game for us; we needed it badly.’’
The save was the 287th of Valverde’s career.
Lucas Duda provided all the offense the Mets needed, hitting the first pitch of his second at-bat into the Mets’ bullpen in right for a two-run shot. He added another two-run homer in the sixth for his fifth career multi-homer game.
Of his 15 homers last season, only two came with men on base.
Catcher Anthony Recker threw out Billy Hamilton trying to steal second base in the eighth inning. It was only the second time the Reds’ speedster has been thrown out 15 major league attempts.
“It was huge. There was a big scream when you can throw him out. You’ve got to make a great throw and he made a great throw,’’ Collins said.
“Yeah, he can run a little bit, I faced him in the minor leagues a couple years ago and he’s just as fast as he was then, so yeah, he can still run,’’ said Recker, who was 0-2 trying to throw out Hamilton in the minors. “But my shortstop told me I had him both times.’’
Left fielder Eric Young Jr. robbed Brandon Phillips of a home run in the first. It proved the margin of victory.
“That pretty much saved the game,” Duda said. “We’d probably still be playing right now if it wasn’t for him.”
Whatever the bullpen’s struggles, Rafael Montero likely won’t be the immediate solution. The highly-touted prospect threw six scoreless frames for Las Vegas Thursday night with five strikeouts to beat Fresno, but Collins said Montero would have to pitch in relief in Triple-A before doing it in the majors.
Noah Syndergaard followed up Montero’s performance with a solid six frames of his own Friday, allowing six hits and two earned runs with just one walk and five strikeouts.