WILLIAMSPORT, Pa. — Amid the hoopla of Sunday night’s eighth Little League Classic and the electricity surrounding Nolan McLean’s MLB debut the day before, reasons for positivity were starting to bubble in Mets world.
Perhaps Sunday’s 7-3 win over the Mariners, the Mets’ second straight after losing 14 of their previous 16 entering Saturday, is a sign that things are turning around.
The Mets (66-58) put on a show for the Little Leaguers in attendance at Journey Bank Ballpark at Historic Bowman Field, racking up 14 hits and putting up two crooked numbers with a four-run fifth and a three-run second. Clay Holmes delivered a strong five innings and earned his first win since July 25.
The game ended with a handshake between both teams, a tradition at the Little League Classic.
“Winning is fun,” Francisco Lindor said. “Winning brings people together. When you’re going through tough times, good teams have conversations among themselves. And when you win, you celebrate a little more.”
Francisco Alvarez, who left the game after the seventh with a right thumb injury, went 3-for-4 and Lindor was 3-for-5. Mark Vientos went 2-for-3 with four RBIs, including a three-run homer in the fifth that gave the Mets a 6-1 lead.
Snapping a streak of five straight series losses, the Mets — Sunday’s designated home team — secured their first series victory since a three-game sweep of San Francisco from July 25-27.
The Mets stayed within five games of the NL East-leading Phillies (71-53) and maintained a 1 1⁄2-game lead over the Reds (65-60) for the NL’s third wild card.
Alvarez doubled to lead off the seventh, sliding into the bag headfirst and seemingly jamming his right hand on the base. He remained in the game to run the bases before Luis Torrens replaced him to start the eighth. Manager Carlos Mendoza said Alvarez will return to New York on Monday for an MRI.
Alvarez missed the Mets’ first 25 games with a fractured hamate bone in his left hand. He missed 52 days with a left thumb sprain last year.
“[It’s] concerning, I’m not going to lie,” Mendoza said. “Because that’s like the third time. But I’m not going to sit here and speculate because we don’t know what we’re dealing with.”
The festivities started at the Williamsport Regional Airport at about 10:30 a.m., when the Mets were greeted by Little Leaguers as they got off the plane. They rode the bus with them to the Little League World Series complex to take in some LLWS action and the Williamsport aura.
After a long day and a 36-minute rain delay, the game finally got underway.
Holmes (10-6, 3.64 ERA) allowed one run, five hits and a walk, struck out four and hit a batter (he drilled Randy Arozarena in the helmet with the game’s first pitch). He threw 88 pitches, 58 for strikes, and exited with the Mets holding a 7-1 lead.
After allowing five runs and five walks in 3 2⁄3 innings in his previous start Tuesday, Holmes showed encouraging signs Sunday. He gave up his only run in the fourth and escaped the inning after loading the bases with two outs.
“I thought he was really good in the strike zone,” Mendoza said. “I thought that changeup was good. The sweeper was good. The sinker, got ground balls, like he stayed on the attack. When he’s doing that, I mean, he’s pretty nasty.”
Vientos’ homer, a 385-foot shot over the tall wall in rightfield, came with two outs in the fifth.
“Right before the at-bat, one of the kids told me, he was like, ‘Hey Vientos, if you hit a home run, you got to give me your bat,’ ” he said. “Unfortunately, I was looking for the kid, I couldn’t find him after that. But it was pretty sick.”
Cedric Mullins then doubled and scored on Lindor’s double, a 377-footer that hit centerfielder Julio Rodriguez’s glove on a basket-catch attempt. The lighting in the 2,366-seat ballpark seemed to be a problem on defensive plays throughout the night.
In the second inning, Alvarez drove in the game’s first run with a double just out of the reach of a diving Rodriguez. Brett Baty’s run-scoring single and Vientos’ sacrifice fly made it 3-0.
Mariners righthander George Kirby (8-6, 4.22 ERA) allowed season highs in runs (seven) and hits (12) in 4 2⁄3 innings.
The Mariners (68-57) cut it to 3-1 in the fourth on Jorge Polanco’s single to center, a 72.9-mph looper that a leaping Lindor whiffed on. Cal Raleigh’s MLB-leading 47th homer, an opposite-field two-run shot to leftfield off Reed Garrett, cut the Mariners’ deficit to 7-3 in the seventh.
“It’s been rough,” Mendoza said. “It’s been tough for all of us. But there’s no looking back now. All we got to do is just worry about what we need to do today to get a W and continue to win series.”
Ben Dickson joined Newsday’s high school sports staff in 2023 after graduating from Maryland, where he covered several of the Terrapins’ teams.
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