Rookie Brett Baty homered on his first big-league swing and Starling Marte went deep twice to power the visiting New York Mets to a 9-7 win over the Atlanta Braves on Wednesday.
The Mets totaled four homers and withstood a pair of late Atlanta comebacks to end the Braves’ eight-game winning streak and restore their lead in the N.L. East to 4 1/2 games.
Baty, New York’s No. 2-ranked prospect according to MLB Pipeline and first-round draft choice in 2019, hit a 1-0 curveball from Jake Odorizzi far enough to clear the wall in right field for a two-run homer in the second inning. He became the fifth Met to homer in his first career at-bat.
Marte and Francisco Lindor hit back-to-back homers in the first inning. Marte added a solo shot off Tyler Yates in the seventh to give him 14 homers. Lindor has 21 homers.
Mets starter Max Scherzer (9-2) pitched 6 1/3 innings and earned his 199th career win. He allowed four runs on three hits, three walks and eight strikeouts.
Scherzer now has 3,154 career strikeouts and moved past Justin Verlander (3,151) and into a tie with Pedro Martinez for 13th on the all-time list.
Scherzer cruised until the seventh inning, retiring 13 in a row in one stretch, but was removed after loading the bases in the seventh. Reliever Adam Ottavino allowed a run to score on a fielder’s choice and surrendered a three-run homer to Robbie Grossman, his fourth. Ottavino walked Ronald Acuna Jr, but he was thrown out trying to steal by James McCann to end the inning.
The Mets scored three insurance runs in the ninth on Pete Alonso’s two-run single and Daniel Vogelbach’s RBI double.
Atlanta scored twice off reliever Trevor May in the ninth on Vaughn Grissom’s two-run single, but he recovered to fan Grossman and retired Acuna on a fly ball.
Odorizzi (4-5) pitched five innings and allowed five runs on eight hits, two walks and two strikeouts.
The game was interrupted by rain for 34 minutes in the third inning.
–Field Level Media