They were his first hits since 2010 for NY.
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“He’s on a roll right now”. We even got to witness the return of Jose’s specialized, celebratory hand shakes and dances with teammates in the dugout… talk about old times. “He makes it look easy”.
Travis d’Arnaud, Jose Reyes and Asdrubal Cabrera also went deep for NY in a slugfest that featured eight home runs – the most in the eight-year history of Citi Field.
The second game of the four-game series between the New York Mets and Washington Nationals will determine whether the Mets have a chance of catching the Nationals atop the National League East by the All-Star break.
Washington’s attempt to rally in the ninth was thwarted when Jayson Werth was called for an illegal takeout slide at second base, giving the Mets a double play after Cabrera made a diving stop at shortstop of Murphy’s sharp grounder. The Mets got the run back in the bottom of the frame with an RBI single from Walker, making it a 9-7 game.
“I feel like it changes from day to day, from series to series and in this case, from inning to inning”, he added.
The Nationals took the lead again in the top of the fifth, when Daniel Murphy – who signed with Washington after winning NL Championship Series MVP honors for the Mets last October – beat out a potential inning-ending double play as Perez scored. The home runs, a one-out solo shot from Bryce Harper and back-to-back solo shots from Clint Robinson and Anthony Rendon were the most home runs that Colon had allowed in a game since April 13, 2014 at Anaheim when he allowed four.
In addition to placing Zimmerman on the DL, the team also sent Lucas Giolito, who made his first career Major League Baseball road start on Thursday, to Triple-A and recalled outfielder Michael A. Taylor and top prospect Trea Turner. He threw 90 pitches over 3 2/3 innings and gave up four runs, seven hits and four walks.
He homered Wednesday against Milwaukee but sat out Thursday night against the Mets with soreness, leaving manager Dusty Baker and the Nationals a player short in their 9-7 loss. “You’ve got to try to give yourself a couple-run cushion, because you never know when somebody’s going to come up with a big hit”. Addison Reed earned a hold for recording four straight outs, setting up Jeurys Familia‘s 31st save of the season. Wilson Ramos delivered an RBI single two batters later to extend the lead to 6-4.
Flores, who had just come off the bench in a double switch to play first base, connected off Oliver Perez (2-2) in the fifth to put NY up 7-6.
Scores of fans jumped out of their seats – seemingly in unison – when Flores connected. The Mets (47-38) rallied twice to erase multiple-run leads, and Flores’ fifth homer in five days took Bartolo Colon off the hook after his season-worst start.
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“Against right-handers, Robinson, I mean he filled in last year and he’s done a great job this year”, Baker said.
