Rookie lefthander Steven Matz received a no-decision against the Cincinnati Reds whom the Mets defeated by a score of 6-4 on Thursday night, reducing their magic number to three.
Matz gave up 10 hits while allowing three runs, all earned. He did show periods of dominance in the game and he struck out eight batters on the night.
The first inning, for the second consecutive start, was a bit of an issue for Matz as he gave up three hits while allowing a run in the opening frame. The Reds continued to chip away at him throughout the night, sprinkling hits here and there, but the pitcher was able to battle through and keep the game from getting out of hand.
“This is definitely the best I’ve felt with commanding the zone and everything,” Matz said after the game. “I felt really good. Today was the best fastball command I’ve had. And that’s really what I work off of. Everything else is getting there. My curveball is just a tick off, still a little up in the zone. But everything else, I feel like, is pretty on.”
Steven threw 93 pitches overall tonight, 68 of which were strikes and he displayed an explosive fastball with great late life although he needs to use his secondary pitches more and become less predictable as his manager pointed out. Otherwise, this was quite an impressive performance for Matz who maintained his perfect 4-0 record, but did see his ERA rise to 2.27 on the season.
Terry Collins was quite impressed with his performance. “His stuff was better tonight than it was his last couple of starts. The arm action on his curveball was much better, much faster. He threw some pretty good sliders. This is just me, but he’s got an outstanding changeup.”
“But I thought he threw the ball very well tonight. It looks like he’s getting back in pretty good shape, to where he was when we first saw him. I thought this is the best stuff he’s had since he’s coming off the DL.”
Matz also continued to show his prowess at the plate by legging out an infield hit and scoring a run to help himself. Steven has been pretty impressive at the plate in his short major league career, currently owning a .286 batting average to lead the pitching staff.
Matz has certainly made a solid case for earning a possible rotation spot come the postseason. With so many great options, it will be interesting to see how the Mets will play this. But it does seems likely that Matz will join Jacob deGrom, Matt Harvey and Noah Syndergaard to form an impressive postseason rotation.
