Let’s face it: Thursday’s Opening Day win was too easy. Too stress-free. The Mets aren’t really, truly back until they have a game that makes you question all the life choices that led to you deciding to spend three precious hours of your day watching them. Well, you best believe it: the Mets are officially BACK after today’s game in which the bats were held silent for three hours, followed by some extra innings nonsense. And yet, while this game was looking like it was going to be the first infuriating
loss of the season, it instead proved to be the first thrilling come-from-behind victory of the season, with Luis Robert Jr. socking an 11th inning walk-off bomb to give the Mets win number two of 2026.
It was a cold and windy day at Citi Field today, and that perhaps played a role in both offenses being helpless for most of the afternoon. Starting pitchers David Peterson and Mitch Keller both put up zeroes in the first four innings while giving up just two hits and keeping their pitch counts low. The Pirates did load the bases with two outs in the top of the fifth against Peterson, but he induced a pop-up to first base from Marcell Ozuna to keep the game scoreless. He got in trouble again in the following inning by giving up two singles—one on a sharp grounder to first that Jorge Polanco couldn’t handle, and another on a bloop single to center—and Carlos Mendoza decided to pull his starter there after 5.1 innings of work in which he surrendered six hits and two walks while recording three strikeouts (a fairly quintessential statline for the longest-tenured Met). But Huascar Brazobán came out of the bullpen and got out of the jam to preserve Peterson’s 0.00 2026 ERA and keep the game scoreless.
Still, the Mets continued to be unable to get any rallies going against Keller. After Luke Weaver tossed a scoreless top of the seventh, the Pirates mercifully went to their bullpen after six scoreless innings from their starter, and it looked like the Amazins might finally break through after back-to-back leadoff walks against Justin Lawrence (who surrendered two homers in Thursday’s game). But he came back to strikeout Brett Baty and Marcus Semien, and the Pirates then brought in Gregory Soto to face Carson Benge, who also struck out to end the threat and prevent the first run of the game from crossing the plate.
After a 1-2-3 inning from Brooks Raley, the Mets tried again to score against Soto in the bottom of the eighth, and Francisco Alvarez started the frame with a leadoff walk and was subsequently pinch-ran for by Tyrone Taylor with the top of the order coming up. Francisco Lindor and Juan Soto were both retired, but Taylor wound up on third base (advancing to second on a wild pitch and to third on a fielder’s choice) to give Bo Bichette—the best hitter with runners in scoring position last year—a chance to give the Mets the lead. Alas, he instead struck out swinging, and the game headed to the ninth with goose eggs on both sides.
Devin Williams came on to make his Mets debut in the top of the ninth. Coming the day after Edwin Díaz made a successful debut for the Dodgers, we were gearing to have some major #discourse from the hysterical population of the Mets fanbase if the team’s new closer blew the game this early in the season. And much like the previous closer, Williams bent—allowing a double and walk in the inning—but did not break, striking out Bryan Reynolds with two outs to end the Pittsburgh threat and send the game into the bottom of the ninth. For the third straight inning—this time against new Pirates pitcher Dennis Santana—the Mets worked a leadoff walk to start the inning, and the winning run advanced to second on a fielder’s choice grounder to first by Luis Robert Jr. Alas, Baty then lined a ball to first base, and the runner at second was doubled off to send the game to extras.
Luis García—who surrendered two runs in his first outing of the season on Thursday—was called upon in the tenth, and the Pirates finally managed to bring home the first run of the ballgame against him on a one-out single to center off the bat of Nick Gonzales. He threatened to give up more after loading the bases on an infield single and a walk, but he retired Jake Mangum on a groundout to third base to keep the deficit at one, giving the Amazins the chance to at least tie the game with the ghost runner at second to start the bottom of the frame.
Well, the Mets finally did score a run in the bottom of the inning—and yet it somehow proved to be the most frustrating inning in a game full of them. Facing off against rookie lefty Hunter Barco with the bottom of the order due up, Semien started things off by getting hit by a pitch. Mendoza then called upon Mark Vientos to pinch-hit for Benge, and Swaggy V started his 2026 season by getting a single to left to load the bases with nobody out. That brought up Luis Torrens, who entered the game after Alvarez left for a pinch-runner earlier. The Mets might have preferred to have the latter up in this spot, but no matter—Torrens came through with another single to left to tie the game and keep the bases loaded. So with no outs and the top of the order coming up, surely the Amazins had this win in the bag, yes? Well… no. Lindor and Soto both had identical outcomes in their respective at-bats, hitting grounders that resulted in force-outs at home plate. Then with two outs, Bichette—who’d already failed with a runner in scoring position earlier—flew out to right field to end the inning. Thus, we were no longer scoreless, but still tied. Onto the eleventh!
With basically everyone else in the bullpen having been used by this point, Mendoza had to turn to Richard Lovelady to try to keep the Pirates off the board. He might be the last man in the bullpen pecking order, but he came pretty dang close to getting out of the inning unscathed after recording the first two outs, with the second out coming via a grounder to second that advanced the ghost runner to second. That unfortunately proved to be consequential, as Reynolds then hit a soft grounder down the third base line that stayed fair and allowed the second Pirates run of the day to score. And Lovelady almost subsequently surrendered even more after Marcell Ozuna lined a ball to right field and put runners on the corners, but he instead struck out Gonzales to end the threat and once again hold the Pirates to just one extra-inning run.
Still, just like last inning, one couldn’t help but feel as though we were setting up for a disappointing end to the game in which the Mets couldn’t bring home the ghost runner. But that very quickly proved to not be the case. Polanco walked to lead-off the inning against Barco, and Robert—lefty-masher that he is—had himself his first signature moment with his new team, as he socked a three-run homer over the left field wall to double the amount of runs scored in today’s game, and to give the Mets the come-from-behind victory.
In the end, it’s just win number two. We still have 160 games to go. But we certainly have seen plenty of these types of games go the other way for the Mets in years past—particularly last season—so to overcome the mostly frustrating affair and come out on the winning side is nevertheless a breath of fresh air. Now we will see the Amazins go for the sweep tomorrow with Nolan McLean taking the mound.
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Big Mets winner: Luis Robert Jr. (duh), +50.4% WPA
Big Mets loser: Luis García and Richard Lovelady, -31.0% WPA
Mets pitchers: +4.8% WPA
Mets hitters: +45.2% WPA
Teh aw3s0mest play: Luis Robert Jr. walk-off three-run homer in the 11th (duh again), +49.1% WPA
Teh sux0rest play: Bryan Reynolds RBI single in the 11th, -34.0% WPA
