QUEENS, NY — The Mets had been encouraged by their offense during the NLCS, even though the stat line during the first four games of the series suggested the exact opposite.
Not only were they shut out in two of the first four games of the series, but they had gone 4-for-29 with runners in scoring position and left 35 men on base while getting outscored 30-9.
With their backs against the wall and facing elimination in Game 5 on Friday night at Citi Field, though, the stars aligned and the offense mashed historically well.
The Mets jumped all over Dodgers starter Jack Flaherty, scoring eight runs on eight hits in the first three innings alone on their way to a 12-6 victory to cut their series deficit to 3-games-to-2.
With it, they became just the third team in Major League Baseball history to score 10 or more runs and not strike out a single time in a postseason game, joining the 1960 Pittsburgh Pirates (Game 7 of the World Series) and the 2002 Los Angeles Angels (Game 2 of the World Series).
“It’s unbelievable,” first baseman Pete Alonso, who went 2-for-3 with a three-run home run in the first inning, said. “It’s just a phenomenal execution of approach by the whole group.”
This was the same Dodgers starter who stifled the Mets in Game 1 on Sunday in Los Angeles, tossing seven scoreless innings while allowing just two hits with six strikeouts and two walks.
On Friday, they ran him from the game after those three innings, mastering an approach that stressed not chasing his offspeed putaway pitches — specifically the slider and knuckle-curve.
“We didn’t chase his secondary pitches,” manager Carlos Mendoza said. “We know he got his slider and his knuckle curve and he’s going to try to make us chase. We didn’t do that today. When he came in the zone with his fastball, we were ready. That’s the key.”
The 12 runs are tied for the second-most in a playoff game in Mets franchise history. So were the 14 hits.
“We’re capable of putting together games like this, especially when 1-9 were clicking,” Mendoza said. “We have a good offense, and we showed it today. We needed that.”
They need to win two more games to keep their season, alive, too. Game 6 of the NLCS is Sunday in Los Angeles where the Mets will hope that the momentum gained on Friday night can make the 2,800-mile trip with them.
“We’ve been having really good at-bats and it’s just today, things fell for us, things went over the wall for us,” Alonso said. “We’re going to continue to have that gritty mentality in the box.”
