The Mets are still alive after beating the Marlins 5-0

After a season of turmoil and despair, the Mets entered Saturday afternoon needing both a win against the Marlins and for the Reds to lose at least one of the next two games against the Brewers. We’ll have to wait and see for the latter, but after the Amazins failed to get the job done in Miami last night, they turned around and got one of their strongest team pitching performances of the year to secure a critical 5-0 victory to ensure that they would not be eliminated from postseason contention

on this day.

Just like in last night’s game, the Mets scored early today. Francisco Lindor led off the game with a walk against Eury Pérez, and he then advanced to second on a wild pitch. With one out, Pete Alonso then doubled to left field to score the first run of the game and put the Mets in prime position to score even more runs—and a subsequent bloop single from Brandon Nimmo put runners on first and third with one out to further improve their chances. Alas, Starling Marte and Jeff McNeil were then retired to end the frame—the former on a fly ball to the outfield that Alonso elected not to try to score on—and the Mets were thus limited to just the one run in the first.

We’ve seen this team suffer from failing to score those extra runs time and time again throughout the year, so nobody could be blamed for expecting them to quickly give up the lead after the bats failed to capitalize further. Instead, Clay Holmes navigated his way through the first couple innings very quickly with little trouble. And in the top of the third, Alonso came to the plate for his second at-bat and once again did some damage against Pérez, hitting a two-out solo homer to left field to make it a 2-0 ballgame. And for quite some time, those two hits from Pete remained just about the only damage the Mets were able to do against the young Marlins starter, who struck out 11 batters across 5.1 innings of work in his final outing of the season. He left in the sixth inning with Alonso on second after he walked and advanced to second on a balk, and Lake Bachar came in to try to maintain the two-run lead. He got Marte to ground out to second for the second out, but McNeil then lined a double to right field to bring Alonso home and give the Mets a three-run lead.

Meanwhile, Holmes remained both effective and economical throughout his entire outing. His most dangerous moment came in the bottom of the fifth, when he gave up two two-out baserunners (on a walk and a single—the latter the first hit against him in the afternoon) to put the then-tying run on-base. But he thankfully recorded a groundout to end the game—one of eleven groundball outs he recorded on the afternoon. All told, he finished with six shutout innings, giving up just four baserunners (the one hit and three walks) in his outing while striking out two. With this outing, Holmes not only ended his 2025 regular season on a high note, but he joined John Maine and Johan Santana as Mets pitchers who provided hugely clutch starting pitching performances in the penultimate games of their respective seasons (just don’t ask how game 162 went those other two times).

Brooks Raley was the first man out of the bullpen after Holmes’s afternoon was done—after the Mets failed to score an insurance run despite getting a leadoff single from Ronny Mauricio, who was then advanced to second on a bunt but stranded there—and he tossed a 1-2-3 seventh inning. The bats failed to add any insurance in the eighth, but Tyler Rogers followed Raley with a perfect inning of his own. It was the kind of two-inning bridge to the ninth that the Mets expected to see a lot more often post-trade deadline. And lo and behold, after putting up zeroes, the offense was finally able to add some insurance in the ninth against new Marlins pitcher George Soriano. Francisco Alvarez started the frame with a broken bat single, and after Mauricio struck out, Tyrone Taylor followed with a single of his own to put runners on first and second. Francisco Lindor then hit a groundball up the middle to score Alvarez from second and move Taylor to third while making it a 4-0 ballgame. Soriano then walked Soto (which set the all-time Mets record for most walks in a season for a batter), with ball four going to the backstop and allowing the runner at third to score to make it a five-run lead.

The Mets failed to score any additional runs in the inning, though. And despite the larger lead—and Ryan Helsley warming in the bullpen—Carlos Mendoza elected to still use Edwin Díaz in the bottom of the ninth. This was a somewhat curious decision—one would think he may have wanted to only use his closer today if it was strictly necessary, and the extra runs may have allowed him to preserve him for a potential multiple-inning outing tomorrow—but in any event, Díaz did shut the door, surrendering a two-out hit-by-pitch but nothing else to close out the game and secure the 5-0 victory.

So now we wait and see. If the Reds lose to the Brewers tonight, the Mets will enter tomorrow needing either another win or another Cincinnati loss to secure a postseason berth. If the Reds win tonight, the Mets will instead need both a win tomorrow and a Cincinnati loss. Either way, the next twenty-four hours will be a hectic one for us all. But if nothing else, we get to hold onto the hope of salvaging the 2025 season for just a little bit longer. Let’s go Mets and let’s go Brewers.

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What’s WPA?

Big Mets winner: Clay Holmes, +35.0% WPA
Big Mets loser: Starling Marte, -12.0% WPA
Mets pitchers: +46.8% WPA
Mets hitters: +3.2% WPA
Teh aw3s0mest play: Pete Alonso solo homer in the third, +10.7% WPA
Teh sux0rest play: Heriberto Hernández walk to put runners on first and second in the fifth, -2.8% WPA