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Schwei's Mets Notes: A Successful Regular Season Comes To An End

By John Schweibacher
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The New York Mets will head to the postseason this week after going just 1-5 over their final six games of the regular season.

The Mets will face the Los Angeles Dodgers in the NLDS, which begins Friday night at Dodger Stadium. The Mets have never lost a best-of-five series. They beat LA in the only one of the five series in which they played the first two games at home:

  •       1969  NLCS: Mets 3 Braves 0
  •       1973  NLCS: Mets 3 Reds 2
  •       1999  NLDS: Mets 3 Diamondbacks 1
  •       2000  NLDS: Mets 3 Giants 1
  •       2006  NLDS: Mets 3 Dodgers 0

David Wright is the only current Mets player who appeared in the 2006 NLDS against the Dodgers, going 4-for-12 with four runs batted in. The only current Dodger who played in that series is Andre Ethier, who lined into a double play as a pinch-hitter in Game 3 in his only at-bat in the series.

The Mets closed out the regular season with a 1-0 win over the Nationals Sunday. Had the Mets lost, they would have finished the 2015 season with six straight losses and the longest losing streak to end a year in club history. The Mets lost five in a row to end the 1976 and 1998 seasons.

Max Scherzer became the fifth pitcher to throw two no-hitters in a single season, striking out 17 Mets batters in a 2-0 victory Saturday night in the second game of the day-night doubleheader.

The Mets became the fourth playoff team in major league history to be no-hit twice in a season, joining the 1917 White Sox, the 2010 Rays and the 2015 Dodgers.

According to the Game Score statistic developed by Bill James -- and found on baseball-reference.com -- it was the best pitching performance ever against the Mets in a 9-inning game:

  •       104   Max Scherzer: Was 10/3/15  9ip  0h 0r  0bb 17 K's
  •         98   Chris Heston:   SF 6/9/15   9ip  0h 0r  0bb 15 K's
  •         97   Andy Benes:    SD 7/3/94   9ip 1h 0r  1bb 13 K's
  •         97   Jim Bunning:  Phi 6/21/94  9ip 0h 0r 0bb 10 K's
  •         95   Ed Halicki:  SF  8/24/75    9ip 0h 0r 2bb 10 K's
  •         95   Sandy Koufax: LA 6/30/62  9ip 0h 0r 5bb 13 K's

Noah Syndergaard allowed one run on two hits and struck out 10 in seven innings Saturday afternoon, but did not get a decision in the Mets' 3-1 loss to the Nationals.

Syndergaard finished his rookie season with 166 strikeouts, the fifth-most in club history for a Mets rookie:

  •       Dwight Gooden 1984:   276
  •       Jerry Koosman 1968:     178
  •       Tom Seaver 1967:         170
  •       Jon Matlack 1972:          169
  •       Noah Syndergaard 2015:  166

Jerad Eickhoff threw seven shutout innings to earn the victory in the Phillies' 3-0 win over the Mets Thursday afternoon. Prior to that game, the Mets had scored three or more runs on the road 33 consecutive times.

The last road game prior to last Thursday where the Mets scored less than three runs was a 7-2 loss back on July 20 at Washington, in the opener of a three-game series. The Mets fell to 16-31 on the road with that loss, and then went 25-9 away from Citi Field the rest of the season.

Seven Philadelphia relievers combined for 8 1/3 scoreless innings last Wednesday night as the Phillies rallied from a 5-0, first-inning hole to beat the Mets, 7-5.

According to the Elias Sports Bureau, it was the most innings pitched without being charged with a run by Philadelphia's bullpen since April 25, 1991, when they threw nine scoreless innings -- also against the Mets, in a 5-3 win.

Phillies starter Pat Combs walked the first three batters he faced that night at Veterans Stadium and was relieved by Tommy Greene, who allowed all three of the inherited runners to score. Greene, Joe Boever, Roger McDowell and Mitch Williams then held the Mets scoreless on three hits the rest of the game.

Lucas Duda had his seventh multi-homer game of the season last Tuesday, but it was not enough as the Mets fell to the Phillies, 4-3. Duda's first home run of the game, in the fourth inning, was the 100th of his career.

According to the Elias Sports Bureau, Duda is one of six players whose first 100 homers in the majors have all come with the Mets:

Ed Kranepool (1963 to 1976 seasons)

Darryl Strawberry (1983 to 1986)

Todd Hundley (1991 to 1997)

Edgardo Alfonzo (1995 to 2001)

David Wright (2004 to 2008)

Lucas Duda  (2010-present)

Mets who fell short of 100 from start of their career:

John Milner  94  (1971-1977)

Cleon Jones  93  (1963-1975)

Jose Reyes    81  (2003-2011)

Ron Swoboda 69 (1965-1970)

Lee Mazzilli   68 (1976-1981)

Ike Davis        68 (2010-2014)

Happy Recap: Brotherly Love -- Travis d'Arnaud played against his brother, Chase, in two games last week in Philadelphia. Travis is the seventh player in club history to appear in at least one game against his brother, joining Norm Sherry (Larry); Wayne Garrett (Adrian); Mike Maddux (Greg); Al Leiter (Mark); Prentice Redman (Tike); and Scott Hairston (Jerry).

Nine Miles of Rough Road: Running out of Runs -- The Mets scored just two runs over their final 43 innings at the plate and scored just once without hitting a home run in the last six games of the season.

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