Even without his best stuff in his second start of the season, Zack Wheeler gave the Mets what they needed. He kept them in the game. He went six innings, not incredibly deep but not a cameo either, so the bullpen wasn’t needed too soon.
And he delivered two hits and scored a run, which was a heck of a lot more than most position players.
After a solid season-coming-out party in Miami six days before, Wheeler did virtually everything the Mets wanted — except get them a win. Wheeler’s decent but not-good-enough performance could not deter a second straight Mets loss as the Nationals won, 5-2, at Citi Field on Tuesday.
“I thought I did OK,” Wheeler said. “I thought I made a couple mistakes when I was ahead in the count, especially there in the fourth. I could have located the ball a little better. Overall, I thought I hung in there well pitched around a couple jams.”
Wheeler mixed fastballs with breaking balls, found himself ahead in most counts and improved the breaking stuff as the game progressed. But also found himself working through a lot of traffic on the basepaths. For the most part he survived — Washington was 3-of-14 with runners in scoring position.
“I’ve always prided myself on that,” Wheeler said of rising when trouble was the most evident. “I really concentrate on shutting the guy down at second, try to make quality pitches, just holding the guy there.”
Wheeler gave up seven hits and three earned runs in his 99-pitch effort. He walked three and struck out two. Wheeler, who went to Triple-A late in spring training before returning and working seven one-run, two-hit innings at Miami to win, slipped to 1-1.
“I thought he threw the ball really well,” manager Mickey Callaway said. “I thought the only mistake he really made in the game was when he walked [Michael A.] Taylor. That probably ended up costing him two runs.”
That came in the fateful fourth. After going up 1-0 on a Bryce Harper sac fly in the third, the Nats went to work in the fourth. Moises Sierra singled and stole second. Taylor walked before Wilmer Difo’s right-side single made it 2-0, a score that lasted until the next guy, Pedro Severino, singled to left driving in Taylor. Wheeler liked his pitch to Difo.
“Nice changeup down and basically he hit it off the ground for a little blooper. It was just one of those nights,” said Wheeler, who doubled and scored the Mets’ first run in the fifth — sliding home on Asdrubal Cabrera’s sac fly. “That hurt. I haven’t slid in a while.”
But what Wheeler did on the mound, not the bases, was what mattered of course.
“He looked pretty good and he didn’t even have his best stuff. His strikeout swing-and-miss stuff wasn’t there,” Callaway said. “He battled through it and got through six and got a quality start.”
