The New York Mets won their 2019 season opener. New general manager Brodie Van Wegen’s fingerprints are all over it.
It was a good day for theNew York Mets, they won their 2019 season-opening game 2-0 over the Washington Nationals. As good as it was for the Amazins, it was even sweeter for their new general manager Brodie Van Wagenen. His offseason moves showed in all aspects of this victory.
One of Van Wagenen’s goals was to have a deep team. Last year the Mets season was sunk by injuries. They open 2019 with their top two third basemen,Jed LowrieandTodd Frazier, on the injured list. No worries, managerMickey Callawaywas able to useJeff McNeilat the corner with no appreciable drop off defensively.
The team was in need of a serious offensive upgrade from the catcher position. None of the five backstops they used hit over .222 last year. Free agent acquisition,Wilson Ramoswas one for four in his Mets debut. He also was part of a highlight reel double play (more on that later).
The trade he made with Seattle on December 3, paid off in spades. Starting with the day’s MVPRobinson Cano. In his first Mets at bat, in the top of the first. he took Nats starterMax Scherzeropposite field for a home run. In doing so, Cano became the 10th New York Mets player to hit a homer in his first at-bat with the team.
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Later in the game, Robbie took an inside pitch the other way to drive in Dominick Smith for the Mets second run of the game. His biggest play came on the defensive end. With the Mets up 1-0 in the third inning, Washington put runners on first and third with one out.Anthony Rendonhit a hard ground ball to McNeil who went to second for one out but instead of turning to first Cano threw home to catchVictor Roblesin a rundown.
The other part of the Mariners deal, closerEdwin Diazdid his thing in the ninth. He got Washington 1-2-3, including a strikeout to end the game. Diaz was set up by another free-agent acquisition,Jeurys Familia, who pitched to four batters in the eighth inning.
Finally,Jacob deGromcontinued where he left off last season. The 2018 National League Cy Young Award winner threw six shutout innings. A former Van Wagenen client when the latter was a player agent, deGrom signed a five-year, $137.5M contract extension with the Mets last week.
Thursday. the New York Mets made their GM look like a baseball genius. Hopefully, the same can be said 161 games from now.
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