ST. LOUIS — It was a roll of the dice, but manager Terry Collins wasn’t going to let Matt Adams potentially beat the Mets facing a right-handed pitcher.
So Collins yanked his closer, Jenrry Mejia, with two outs in Wednesday’s ninth inning and inserted journeyman lefty Dana Eveland. The Mets got the desired result when Adams was retired on a slow grounder with the tying run at first base.
“Jenrry actually has great numbers against lefties,” Collins said after the Mets beat the Cardinals 3-2 at Busch Stadium. “It’s just that this guy [Adams] has killed righties this last week. I wasn’t going to let him do it again.”
Mejia had entered to protect a two-run lead and appeared in the clear after getting Matt Holliday to hit into a double play. But Allen Craig followed with an RBI single, prompting the switch to Eveland.
“Once Mejia is in the game you normally assume your closer is in there to stay,” Eveland said. “But Adams has been swinging the bat pretty well and I could throw a decent slider, I guess, so they figured it was a decent matchup, so they went with it.”
Eveland recorded his second career save. It was his first since Sept. 5, 2005 with the Brewers.
Eveland, who pitched in Korea last season, said he’s just happy to contribute.
“I went into spring training with the idea that if I can stay in Triple-A all year and throw OK, I’ll be happy because it will line me up and hopefully I can go get a job next year and possibly compete to get back to the big leagues,” Eveland said.
“But it happened so fast this year, I made a couple of mechanical adjustments early in the season and then all of a sudden I started doing really well, started striking out guys.”
Eveland said he lowered his arm slot earlier this year after watching Jacob deGrom throw.
“I love the way he throws a baseball,” Eveland said. “I lowered my arm slot slightly and all of a sudden my slider started sweeping a little bit more and it didn’t quite have the loop in it and it’s been quite effective.”