ATLANTA — And so, 2 hours and 58 minutes after they clinched their playoff berth, the Mets finally got to celebrate. With goggles over their eyes and cigars in their mouths, the Mets popped corks of Freixenet prosecco and doused each other in Coors Light. They had done what was unexpected entering the season and unfathomable early in it.
As they stopped each other for selfies, president of baseball operations David Stearns stood in the back, his dress shirt already drenched through.
“This is where we should be,” Stearns said. “This is the standard.”
The Mets have played baseball for 63 seasons and nearly 10,000 regular-season games. The best of them was Monday afternoon.
“The best I’ve ever played in,” said José Iglesias, the 12-year veteran. “That was real baseball.”
“Honestly?” said Mark Vientos. “I felt like I was on a roller coaster.”
“That was one of the craziest games I’ve ever been a part of,” manager Carlos Mendoza said. “Like, you could write a book.”
If ever nine innings could recapitulate the twists and turns of this 162-game Mets season, New York’s 8-7 win over Atlanta in the opener of Monday’s doubleheader pulled it off. An early deficit, a rollicking comeback, a near collapse and ultimate redemption — the Mets stuffed eight months of drama into two innings of baseball. You will see it on SNY every time it rains for the next decade.
New York scored six times in the top of the eighth to turn a three-run deficit into a three-run lead. Brandon Nimmo, who sprints to first base on walks, strutted out of the box on the home run that capped the outburst.
“It was euphoria coming over you,” he said.
It was not enough. Atlanta responded with four in the bottom of the inning off Phil Maton and Edwin Díaz.
And then Francisco Lindor happened, as he has throughout this magical season for the shortstop. He and Iglesias had talked about an adjustment in the middle innings — “What adjustment?” you may have asked Iglesias, only to receive a smirk in return — for Lindor’s swing. He singled in the six-run eighth. He drove Pierce Johnson’s first-pitch curveball into Mets lore in the ninth — a two-run shot that put New York back ahead.
“There’s nothing better than a leader that goes out and does it,” said team owner Steve Cohen.
“An exclamation point on the season for Francisco,” Nimmo said.
As the ball landed in right field, Díaz snuck right next to Mendoza and demanded the ball for the bottom of the inning. Through a one-out single and a mound visit from Mendoza himself, Díaz delivered.
“That was gangster,” Adam Ottavino said. “It’s the ultimate example of, you get knocked down and you get back up.”
It was also the ultimate example of the trust Mendoza has shown in his team all year. An 0-5 start, being 11 games under .500 at the end of May? Neither punctured Mendoza’s belief in his team.
“There are so many moments, not only on the field but off the field, that they kept going,” Mendoza said. “They were willing to get better day in and day out.”
“We’ve overcome so much adversity,” said Pete Alonso. “It’s been such an uphill battle for us. This celebration is so, so deserved.”
Next to Mendoza in the alcohol-soaked clubhouse, just as he’s next to him in the dugout most innings, was pitching coach Jeremy Hefner — integral to coaxing the best out of a rotation of purported retreads. On Monday, Tylor Megill — a bane to most Mets fans for how he had stagnated since his rookie season — had kept New York in the game. The Mets needed him to start six games down the stretch for the injured Paul Blackburn. New York won all six.
“It’s really hard to articulate how proud I am of them, how they rallied around each other,” Hefner said of the rotation. “This is the best team I’ve ever been on. Maybe not the most talented, but the best team.”
For so many on the roster, this celebration was two years in waiting. When New York clinched its last postseason berth in 2022, the team declined to pop champagne. They would wait, the players said, for the division clincher. It never came, waylaid by a series sweep here at Truist Park.
More than two years later, the Mets could have that celebration, right back here in Atlanta.
“A lot of guys,” Ottavino said, “were really looking forward to enjoying it.”
“This is beyond incredible,” said Alonso. “This is more than I imagined.”
“This is the way it’s supposed to be,” Nimmo said. “This is the culmination of a lot of hard work. It’s hard to put it into words.”
“It was important,” Stearns said, “for us to do this here.”
Why?
He chuckled.
“I grew up a Mets fan in the ‘90s,” Stearns said. “This has been a miserable place for the Mets.”
Nimmo looked around at the celebration, now moved out to the infield grass at Truist Park. The Braves had been the “kings of the East,” he said for the last six years. So to clinch here did mean more.
“It’s such a sweet feeling,” he said. “It’s beautiful.”
As the Mets finished their team picture on the infield grass, travel secretary Edgar Suero started to corral them.
“8:30 bus,” he shouted.
It was a reminder that as good as this moment felt, as much as the Mets would enjoy it tonight, there is no time for excess, no off day to travel and recalibrate. The Mets flew from Milwaukee to Atlanta on Sunday night. They’re flying from Atlanta back to Milwaukee on Monday night, a Wild Card Series with the Brewers set to start Tuesday. Luis Severino will get the ball for New York.
The T-shirts handed out in the clubhouse read “OCTOBER READY.” The Mets think they’re apt.
“The job’s not done,” Nimmo said.
“It’s not going to be easy,” Mendoza said. “But we’re ready to go.”
“Why not?” Cohen said. “This team can do it.”
Vientos thought back on that first game.
“That was playoff baseball, man,” he said. “Let’s keep going.”
(Top photo: Edward M. Pio Roda / Getty Images)
