NEW YORK — Early Sunday evening, as the last of the sold-out crowd searched for their seats, the playoff atmosphere at Citi Field was palpable. When Pete Alonso stepped to the plate for his first at-bat of the night, fans rose to give him a standing ovation in what might have been his final home game as a Met.
Outfielder Brandon Nimmo likes to say that the Mets have been playing playoff baseball for weeks now; manager Carlos Mendoza often jokes that they’ve been playing this baseball since June. Regardless of when that trend began, New York really is playing playoff baseball now, which was evident throughout its 2-1 win over the Phillies. Nimmo hit a tiebreaking home run in the sixth inning, Edwin Díaz pitched the final two innings and a quartet of Mets pitchers outworked Zack Wheeler to keep the Mets in prime position in the National League wild-card race.
The Mets held a two-game lead over the Braves, who they will meet again for a crucial three-game series starting Tuesday in Atlanta. All New York has to do is win one of those three games to maintain control of its destiny.
To reach this point, the Mets won three of four games against the first-place Phillies, who failed to clinch the NL East title at Citi Field. Tylor Megill held Philadelphia to one run over the first four innings Sunday, Phil Maton and José Buttó combined for three perfect innings in relief, and Díaz earned a six-out save to seal the victory.
