With less than two weeks to go and a playoff spot in doubt, the Mets had seen enough of the middle-inning struggles of Clay Holmes and Sean Manaea. Two halves of a starting pitcher were stacked together, the club finally acknowledging it would not extract better versions of the pitchers and instead would attempt to maximize the pitchers they are right now.
If this were an announcement that it was time for the team to shift into gear, the offense heard it, too.
The piggybacking was effective and the bats better than that in a thorough beating of the Padres, 8-3 in front of 41,819 at Citi Field on Tuesday, when the Mets looked like they rarely have in the second half — like a playoff team.
In going from an eight-game skid to winning two straight, Carlos Mendoza’s crew (78-73) temporarily moved two games ahead of the Diamondbacks, who were set to host the Giants late Tuesday.
With Holmes (four innings of two-run ball) and Manaea (five one-run innings) combining to quiet a solid Padres offense and spare the Mets bullpen, the Mets got a peek of a tandem that could find its way into a postseason start.
With an offense that received contributions from every part of the order, the Mets got a peek at how they can bash their way to and through October.
The only negative to surface for the club was Francisco Alvarez being removed from the game after his left arm was struck by a 99.8 mph fastball in the eighth inning.
The strength of the 2025 Mets is an attack that was the game’s best in August. And yet for 11 consecutive games that included nine losses in which the club collapsed, the Mets had not exceeded five runs.
It took two innings against Michael King — an ace, albeit one building up from injury — for the Mets to beat that.
They bashed their way to seven runs on nine hits before recording a sixth out, allowing them to roll to their first nonstressful victory in weeks.
The tone was set immediately: Four straight singles scored one run and loaded the bases without an out in the first, but Mark Vientos’ comebacker that turned into a double play threatened to end the inning with disappointment.
Instead, Jeff McNeil tucked a double inside the first base line to score two more, and Brett Baty hammered a two-run blast off the facing of the second deck in right to score five against King in the first.
Two more solo shots — one from Francisco Lindor (perhaps energized by his violinist wife’s national anthem performance) and one from Pete Alonso — created more distance in the second. A struggling Cedric Mullins clubbed his own to knock out King in the fourth, providing more than enough runs for the latest Mets pitching experiment.
The damage done, the Mets offense put up its feet for the rest of the game and watched the pitching go to work.
Holmes, throwing harder than usual because of the lesser expectations for length, allowed just three hits in four innings — but two of those three left the yard, solo shots from Jackson Merrill and Jake Cronenworth.
After 53 pitches, Holmes passed the ball to Manaea, who used four-seamers and sweepers to blaze his way through five innings in which he allowed just four hits — including a home run to Freddy Fermin — walked none and struck out four.
In his previous 16 starts, Holmes had recorded just six outs past the fifth inning, which had put a large strain on the bullpen.
In Manaea’s 10 starts this season, he had recorded just two outs past the fifth inning.
When stitched together, though, the Mets bullpen received a rare night off.
