NEW YORK _ On Aug. 15, the day he was ejected for hitting Atlanta's Ronald Acuna Jr. with his first pitch of the game, Jose Urena's season was in shambles. The Marlins' Opening Day starter was 3-12 and he was about to serve a six-game league suspension for the Acuna incident.
That was Urena's nadir.
In the six weeks since, Urena has undergone a complete and unexpected transformation, salvaging what had been a disaster of a season and turning it into one he can feel better about over the winter months.
Urena notched his sixth straight winning decision Friday in what was his final start of the season, an 8-1 Marlins victory over the Mets, to improve his record to 9-12 while lowering his ERA under 4.00 for the first time.
Urena became the fourth Marlins pitcher to win five games in September, joining Pat Rapp (1995), Anibal Sanchez (2006) and Javier Vasquez (2011). Urena's six-game winning streak is the longest by a Marlins pitcher since Jose Fernandez won eight straight starts in 2016. Urena's ERA for September: 1.20.
On Friday, Urena gave up a run on five hits over six innings and spoiled David Wright's long-awaited comeback by retiring the Mets star on a ground ball in the fifth. Wright, who was appearing in a major-league game for the first time in more than two years, came up as a pinch-hitter to a standing ovation at Citi Field. He will start Saturday in what his expected to be the final game of his career.
Urena has never lost at Citi Field, where he is now 4-0 in four career starts.
