NEW YORK _ It appears the one thing the Mets were missing from this nightmare of a series was Jacob deGrom.
DeGrom dominated on the mound and tossed in his first career home run for good measure, as the Mets made what has been an impossible task these past three days _ defeating the first place Nationals _ look downright easy. The 5-1 victory at Citi Field prevented the four-game sweep as the Mets head to the west coast. It's the first time they've beaten the Nationals at home this year in seven tries.
Having recovered from a rough two starts, deGrom built off his last resurgence start, a complete game performance. He allowed no earned runs on three hits over eight innings, with two walks and six strikeouts. His ERA dropped from 4.74 on June 6, to 3.94. It helped that the Mets weren't facing anyone named Max Scherzer or Stephen Strasburg, though Joe Ross was hardly the easy mark his 5.98 ERA would indicate. He allowed two earned runs on nine hits, with a walk and four strikeouts over six innings.
T.J. Rivera was 4-for-4 with a run, tying a career high in hits for a game, while Michael Conforto was 2-for-3 with two RBIs.
DeGrom allowed one unearned run in the first, when Brian Goodwin hit a two-hopper to Wilmer Flores _ moved to second because he's more comfortable there _ and Flores missed it on the backhand. One batter later, Ryan Zimmerman drove him in to give the Nationals the lead.
But deGrom, ever the overachiever, wouldn't let his efforts go to waste. He homered on the very first pitch of the third inning, a shot to left that just eked over the wall, to tie the game. It was the first home run from a Mets pitcher since Noah Syndergaard did it in August of last year. Then, in the fourth, the Mets finally _ finally _ had something go their way.
The leadoff hitter, Lucas Duda, popped one up to shallow right, and the fans finally got to experience benefitting from the flip side of Daniel Murphy. Though Murphy continues to hurt his old team at the plate, he experienced an old school fielding gaffe on the Duda ball, losing it in the sun. T.J. Rivera singled with one out, and d'Arnaud tacked on another single to right. This time, Duda, barreling home, looked dead to rights, but Matt Wieters dropped the ball for an unearned run and the Mets lead.
After deGrom struck out, Conforto tacked on, lining a single that popped in and out of Anthony Rendon's glove for a base hit, scoring Rivera.
Conforto added another RBI in the sixth: With Travis d'Arnaud on second, he hit a two-out single to left to put the Mets up 4-1. Granderson added an RBI single off Matt Grace in the seventh.
