NEW YORK (AP) - There’s a tried-and-true formula for beating the Mets with NL Cy Young Award winner Jacob deGrom on the mound. The Philadelphia Phillies executed perfectly Friday night.
“We waited them out,” Jay Bruce said.
Bruce hit a go-ahead single in the ninth inning off closer Edwin Díaz, Mets manager Mickey Callaway lost an early replay challenge that might have cost him late and the Phillies beat New York 7-2 to spoil another gem from deGrom.
Nine days after blowing a save in Philadelphia, Díaz (1-6) allowed J.T. Realmuto’s double and Bruce’s RBI single to start the ninth, which snapped a 2-all tie. The Phillies poured it on after that, batting around and scoring five runs against Díaz, Jeurys Familia and Luis Avilán. Jean Segura drove in two with a double, and Bryce Harper scored him with a two-base hit to cap a rocky day that started with three strikeouts against deGrom.
“Shows the resiliency of the guys here,” Bruce said.
Philadelphia tied it in the seventh on a close play that Callaway couldn’t challenge. Rhys Hoskins scored on César Hernández’s slow roller toward third, but replays showed catcher Wilson Ramos likely tagged Hoskins before he touched the plate. The Mets couldn’t ask for a review, however, because Callaway had unsuccessfully used the club’s challenge in the second inning on Todd Frazier’s stolen base attempt.
Callaway came out to discuss Hoskins’ slide with crew chief Brian Gorman, who explained that umpires can’t initiate a review until the eighth inning.
Callaway said he was confident Frazier was safe, so he didn’t really regret that challenge.
“It’s hard to look back when you think that,” he said. “But the hard part was that he was just out at home.”
DeGrom allowed two runs and three hits over seven innings, striking out 10 after allowing a homer to Scott Kingery on the first pitch of the game. New York is 16-30 in deGrom’s last 46 starts even though he has a 2.15 ERA in that time. The bullpen lost 14 of those games.
“He understands what his job is,” Callaway said of deGrom. “He can’t do other people’s jobs.”
Díaz has a 15.27 ERA in his past eight appearances. Callaway said the 2018 AL All-Star is healthy but has struggled with his slider, which he thought was sharper Friday.
“I thought I threw some pretty good pitches,” Díaz said through a translator. “The entire outing, I felt pretty good. But the results weren’t there for me.”
The Phillies have won six straight over the Mets for the first time since a nine-game streak spanning 2007 and ’08. New York has won the season series the past seven years, but Philadelphia is 8-3 in the rivalry this season and needs two more wins to end that skid.
Pete Alonso accounted for New York’s runs with his 29th homer and an RBI double. He scored fellow All-Star Jeff McNeil with the latter against Vince Velasquez to make it 2-1 Mets in the fifth.
Adam Morgan (3-3) got two outs on two pitches to end the eighth.
OLD FRIEND
Bruce also beat the Mets with a game-ending double during Philadelphia’s four-game sweep at home last week. New York traded him away twice in the past two years, including in a seven-player deal that brought back Díaz from Seattle in the offseason.
“Irony for sure,” Bruce said with a laugh. “I don’t pay too much attention to it, though.”
GOLD, JERRY
The Mets celebrated “Seinfeld Night” 30 years to the day after the show’s debut. Mets fan Jerry Seinfeld threw out the first pitch, a perfect strike from a full windup atop the mound.
“On the money,” Seinfeld said. “It was the greatest moment of my life.”
The comedian’s first pitch was better than deGrom’s. Kingery launched that one into the second deck in left field, showing no ill effects from a long Thursday - after a July 4 night game in Atlanta, the Phillies didn’t check into their Manhattan hotel until around 4 a.m.
HERRERA PUNISHED
Prior to the game, the commissioner’s office announced that Phillies outfielder Odúbel Herrera had accepted a suspension without pay for the rest of the season, including the playoffs, for violating the league’s domestic violence policy.
Herrera was arrested at a casino in Atlantic City, New Jersey, on May 27 on a domestic assault charge, which was dismissed Wednesday after the woman, his girlfriend, declined to press charges.
TRAINER’S ROOM
Phillies: Called up RHP Yacksel Rios from Triple-A Lehigh Valley and optioned LHP Austin Davis to the IronPigs.
Mets: OF J.D. Davis was available after going to the hospital this week due to a virus. Callaway said Davis lost some weight fighting the bug. Davis pinch-hit for deGrom in the seventh and flied out.
UP NEXT
Phillies RHP Jake Arrieta (8-6, 4.43 ERA) faces Mets RHP Noah Syndergaard (5-4, 4.56) on Saturday night. Arrieta allowed two homers and five runs against New York on June 25. Syndergaard last faced Philadelphia on April 15, when he permitted five runs in five innings.
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