So on a day Mets manager Terry Collins anointed Ruben Tejada his starting third baseman for now, when Jeurys Familia got a five-out save that included a strikeout of a guy whose home runs are measured in light years and when Bartolo Colon tied the major league lead in wins, what was the real burning question?
Was Colon thinking triple on his second-inning RBI double?
“No shot,” Colon said through a translator.
And Collins’ thought on the matter, one of the key moments in the Mets’ 4-3 sweep-averting victory over Miami at Citi Field Sunday, was whether or not Colon would even try for two.
“I wasn’t sure [first-base coach Tom Goodwin] was going to send him to second,” Collins said.
“Didn’t pay attention to Goodwin, I was looking at Ichiro [Suzuki in center field,] reading the number on his back.”
Goodwin waved and Colon made it easily as his drive eluded Suzuki and rolled to the wall, scoring Anthony Recker from second and giving the Mets a 2-1 lead. Although the afternoon’s most-talked-about hit, it wasn’t the game’s most important. That distinction belonged to Tejada, whose seventh inning one-hop double to the wall in left put the Mets ahead, 4-3, with Familia doing the heavy lifting from there.
But it was the work by Colon (8-3) that made most of the other stuff possible.
“At my age [42], I’d rather pitch than concentrate on running or swinging the bat,” Colon said.
So Colon threw seven innings, allowing three runs and six hits. He struck out two and didn’t walk anyone as he unleashed his usual fastball-heavy assortment of pitches, spiked with sliders and changeups.
“In the clubhouse? Just pay attention. He doesn’t have to say a word,” Collins said. “If you’re just a guy, a pitcher especially, pay attention. There’s a reason this guy has pitched for [18] years. And if you could do nothing else, learn about how he goes about things mentally.
“You don’t have to copy him — don’t copy him physically — just how he gets ready to pitch every night, I think it’s going to help your career,” Collins said in praise of Colon, who took the NL lead in wins while tying Seattle’s Felix Hernandez for the most in the majors.
Colon surrendered a run in the second when shortstop Wilmer Flores made a tough stab of Christian Yelich’s bid for a hit and turned it into an RBI forceout. Yelich doubled and scored on a groundout in the fifth and Justin Bour had a solo home run in the sixth to tie it, 3-3. Colon exited for a pinch hitter in the seventh before Tejada’s double made him the winning pitcher.
“For the most part, he’s on all the time,” Recker said. “Occasionally you can tell he’s going to struggle or going to have to fight through it a little bit, but today was one of those days where he looked like he was going to spot up and he did.”
You don’t win eight games through May by accident — in fact he is just the third Mets pitcher ever with at least four wins in both April and May.
“I give all credit to the hitters and the team because they are playing well and the offense is scoring runs when I pitch,” Colon said. “I’ve been able to have better command of my pitches, put the ball where I wanted to and be able to concentrate on in-and-out and make the hitters uncomfortable.”
Flores aided two Mets runs, homering in the third, a solo shot, his eighth, for a 3-1 lead after reaching on a run-scoring error in the first.
After Tejada broke the tie with his double that followed an intentional walk to Curtis Granderson, Miami threatened in the eighth. With one on, the powerful Giancarlo Stanton came to the plate. So Collins came to the mound and Familia came into the game. Collins didn’t plan on a five-out save but up 4-3, Familia “was going to face Stanton.”
Faced him. Fanned him. Bour then singled, but Familia got pinch-hitter Jeff Baker on a comebacker. He worked a one-hit ninth, leaving Colon’s hitting to become a prime topic of the postgame conversation.
