Nolan McLean has opportunely carried the Mets' rotation since making his major league debut last month, but neither he nor his supporting cast helped make his latest outing blemish-free.
The lauded rookie's spotless ERA at Citi Field received its first smudges on Saturday afternoon, as a handful of second-inning defensive blunders hampered the Mets early in a frustrating 5-3 loss to the division-rival Nationals in 11 innings.
With a pristine 1.19 ERA entering the weekend — the lowest mark through six starts in Mets history — minor hiccups were inevitable for McLean. But only one of the three total runs that he allowed was earned, and he ultimately completed five innings with six punchouts on 92 pitches.
"I felt like my stuff felt good," McLean said. "The first couple of innings, I could've done a much better job getting ahead. Also once I got the two strikes, I could've done a better job expanding the zone and throwing a few more putaway pitches."
After allowing a leadoff infield single in the second that popped out of Francisco Lindor's glove at short, McLean saw a subsequent single trickle to the right field warning track due to a misplay from Juan Soto. The ugly error allowed a run to score, and the string of bad luck didn't end there.
Just two pitches later, a well-placed chopper toward Pete Alonso on the grass at first produced a looping underhand toss that prevented McLean from stepping on the bag in time. While the play was initially ruled an out, the Nationals challenged the call and replay showed that the runner was safe.
McLean recovered nicely after the messy sequence, inducing a pair of swinging strikeouts with runners on the corners. But before completing the inning, he sailed a two-strike fastball past catcher Francisco Alvarez that allowed another run to cross the plate. The lone earned run charged to him came in the first inning, on an RBI groundout.
"We didn't make a couple of plays behind him, but I thought stuff-wise, he was really good again," Mets manager Carlos Mendoza said of McLean. "They ran his pitch count up for five innings there. But I think other than the execution when he was ahead, he was pretty good."
McLean will have to settle with an equally sweet 1.27 ERA through seven appearances, and in spite of the few mistakes, he generated eye-popping run on his two-seamer and baffling horizontal break on his sweeper.
He also made more MLB history, becoming just the second pitcher ever to record 45-plus strikeouts with six or fewer runs allowed across their first seven big league outings. Sheer dominance from a 24-year-old with ace-level makeup and expectations.
While the Mets' rotation plan for a potential NL wild-card berth is anything but concrete, McLean couldn't be more valuable to the staff. He's lined up to make one last regular season start next weekend, in a road matchup against the Marlins.
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