CINCINNATI -- If the Mets are to force their way back into the National League Wild Card picture, they will need both Nolan McLean and Freddy Peralta -- the two pitchers they once assumed would stand atop their rotation all season -- to perform like frontline starters.
McLean did exactly that in a 9-1 win over the Reds on Wednesday at Great American Ball Park, holding Cincinnati to one run over seven innings in his deepest outing in more than a month. Backed by a resurgent Mets offense that rapped out 11 hits in half a game against Reds starter Nick Lodolo, McLean cruised to his first victory of June.
Perhaps most telling, McLean walked only one batter for the first time since May 8. His ERA over his last four starts is 1.64.
“Man, that was excellent,” manager Carlos Mendoza said. “He dominated that lineup.”
The afternoon was a showcase in fastball command for McLean, who had previously struggled to place his pitches in the strike zone. On Wednesday, McLean did so with aplomb, throwing strikes nearly 70 percent of the time with his four-seamer and generating five whiffs on that pitch. McLean’s final offering of the afternoon was a 97.8 mph four-seamer on the outside corner, freezing Matt McLain for the Reds’ ninth strikeout.
“Awesome,” was how third baseman Bo Bichette described McLean’s outing. “He was attacking with every pitch, and obviously, he’s got what, five-plus pitches? When he’s doing that, he’s pretty good.”
“He was on today. He was spot-on,” added Mendoza. “And the way he was using not only the four-seamer, but the sinker, the cutter, allowed him to use his secondary pitches. But man, that was pretty impressive there.”
The Mets, by contrast, had no trouble putting the ball in play against Lodolo. They rapped out 10 singles over the first five innings before A.J. Ewing finally chased the left-hander with a two-run double in the fifth. Six different Mets scored at least one run to back McLean.
“I don’t know about satisfying, but it felt good,” said Bichette, who combined with Juan Soto on six of the team’s 15 total hits. “We needed to come out here and win a game.”
This was the version of McLean the Mets saw with regularity last season, when he went 4-1 with a 1.27 ERA over his first seven career starts. Although McLean has never featured impeccable control, he was around the strike zone enough as a rookie to keep hitters guessing. This year, in addition to McLean’s walk rate spiking from 3.0 to 3.7 per nine innings (entering Wednesday’s play), his scouting report has gotten around the league. Hitters have been less willing to swing at pitches low in the zone against McLean, resulting in a significantly lower ground-ball rate than he featured a year ago.
That wasn’t the case Wednesday, as the Reds consistently whiffed and beat the ball into the ground. Against Cincinnati in particular, the difference in McLean was easy to see. In a May 25 start in New York, McLean allowed a career-high seven earned runs. This time around, he gave up merely three hits in what he called one of his best starts of the year.
“I think we saw the better version [Wednesday],” Reds manager Terry Francona said. “Everybody sees the velocity, but I thought his breaking ball was really good. The last time in New York, it was out of the zone enough. It was good today.”
Now, if McLean can bottle this sort of performance and repeat it every five games, the Mets will be in a far better spot. If Peralta can do the same, they may even be able to approach some semblance of their preseason expectations.
“I wouldn’t say I put any more pressure or responsibility on myself,” McLean said. “Every time I go out there, I’m trying to win a baseball game. I think if everybody’s trying to do that and we’re all pulling the same rope, good things will happen.”
At the end of last week, McLean and Peralta were a combined 7-9 with a 4.02 ERA -- numbers more befitting of mid-rotation starters than aces. They’ve each won their latest rotation turn, though, allowing a combined two runs (one earned) over 12 innings.
It’s only two games, but it is a necessary start.
"I think that’s contagious, too,” Mendoza said. “Hopefully, what Nolan did today, now we got Sean [Manaea] tomorrow and Freddy and some of the other guys, we need them to step up. They’re more than capable. So, trust those guys. They’re going to go on a run here.”