Last night the Mets finally responded with a knockout of their own led by the God of Thunder and Captain America in a 9-3 Game 3 win over the Kansas City Royals at Citi Field. Here are five things I took away from the victory last night:
1. Noah Syndergaard is just a rookie but he didn’t pitch like one last night keeping his composure after two rough innings to start his outing. After Jacob deGrom and Matt Harvey combined for only 10 swings and misses in the first two games combined, Noah produced 16 last night. Thor also got a hit on a 0-2 pitch setting up the game-winning home run by Curtis Granderson.
2. David Wright had the best playoff performance of his career in the first World Series game in Citi Field history, the night he has been waiting for. The moment he lifted that 97 MPH from Yordano Ventura into the left field seats could end up being one of the most important hits of his career. The Mets were losing 1-0 already in the first inning of a series they trailed 2-0 and that homerun was exactly what the team and fans needed. He has himself a pretty good game defensively at third base as well showing he isn’t letting that one error effect him.
3. Juan Uribe is back and could be a huge factor off the bench for the rest of the series. The Mets now have a threat off the bench that they can use in big spots like they did last night pushing Michael Cuddyer into his proper role of teaching Thor magic tricks. A pinch-hit RBI single from a guy who hasn’t swung a bat in a game since September 28th is pretty dang impressive.
4. I cursed out Terry Collins for some of the moves (or lack of moves) he made in Game 1 but last night he was back at it, waving his magic wand. He made the right move by sticking with Syndergaard and letting him pitch through some troubles despite not being hit hard. Going to Juan Lagares as a pinch hitter in the 6th inning was huge, igniting a four-run rally. Maybe the biggest move was made before the game when he decided to keep Wright in the number two hole.
5. I have already covered in the previous game takeaways about the fantastic defense of Wilmer Flores, the Mets MVP Curtis Granderson and the Royals defense showing some weaknesses. All of those things showed up again last night but I would regret writing this piece without talking about how great the crowd and atmosphere was at Citi Field last night. Mets fans have waited a long time to cheer their team on in a World Series game again, and they did their team and city proud last night.
Tonight the Mets turn to their rookie left-hander Steven Matz to tie up the series and keep their perfect 1.000 winning percentage at Citi in World Series games.
