As the Mets began their series against the St. Louis Cardinals, left-handed pitcher José Quintana was set to pitch. Since returning from his rib injury and making his Mets debut, Quintana had been excellent in 24 2/3 innings, allowing only eight runs in that span.

He continued this positive trend on Thursday. In fact, he flirted with a perfect game for the first three innings until he allowed a single to Paul Goldschmidt in the bottom of the fourth inning. Consequently, he escaped a bases-loaded jam that occurred in that same inning with the help of good defense from shortstop Francisco Lindor.

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“He’s a guy that chases command instead of velocity. In a lot of ways he’s kind of a throwback,” Mets’ manager Buck Showalter said after the game.

The only damage came in the seventh inning when he allowed a home run to Tyler O’Neill. He failed to record an out in that inning and was subsequently replaced by relief pitcher Drew Smith. Smith entered with no outs and two runners on base and allowed one of them to score on a sacrifice fly, which was charged to Quintana.

Mets’ first baseman Pete Alonso also took notice of Quintana’s stellar performance.

“José Quintana is awesome. He was going full attack mode the whole night, it was really awesome to watch,” he said after the game.

Quintana’s final line on Thursday: 6+ IP, 3 H, 2 ER, 4 BB, 5 K

He threw 97 pitches and dispersed the four-pitch types in his repertoire pretty evenly. His most effective pitch was his curveball, for which he generated five called strikes and four whiffs (35 percent CSW%) out of the 26 times he used it. That said, everything worked for Quintana on Thursday, as he generated 11 swings and misses with an overall CSW% of 27 percent.

With this outing, Quintana has pitched at least six innings in five of his six starts this season while ceasing to allow more than three runs. Due to this consistency, Quintana has emerged as a reliable option for 2024, when he will be in the final year of his two-year agreement with the club.

Despite his string of solid outings, this was only Quintana’s first win with his new team. As a result, he was elated in his postgame media availability session, and credited his teammates for their support.

“Álvarez called a really good game, and I felt really good out there.”

It is encouraging that yet another veteran pitcher is raving about the rookie catcher’s game-calling skills. Also, it is good to hear that Quintana is feeling healthy, as he suffered from a tough injury that sidelined him for an extended period of time. Quintana’s continued durability will be important for the Mets, as they look to turn their fortunes around in 2024.