NEW YORK—Mark Vientos, Pete Alonso, Brandon Nimmo and Francisco Alvarez homered off Taijuan Walker, and the New York Mets scored 10 runs in three straight games for the first time in their 63-season history with a 10–6 victory over the Philadelphia Phillies on Thursday night.
Philadelphia, which leads the NL East by six games over second-place New York, failed in its second attempt to clinch after losing Wednesday at Milwaukee. The Phillies would clinch a playoff berth with one win over the Mets during the four-game series and would clinch their first division title since 2011 with two victories over the Mets this week.
New York won its fourth straight game and for the 16th time in its last 20, maintaining a two-game lead over Atlanta for the NL’s final wild-card position.
“We know we’re good,” manager Carlos Mendoza said. “We’re capable of having games like that.”
Rookie Luisangel Acuña, a brother of Atlanta star Ronald Acuña Jr., drove in the 10th run with an RBI triple in the seventh off José Alvarado. The Mets were coming off 10–1 and 10–0 routs of Washington and are 61–33 following a 24–35 start.
“It’s pretty amazing that the Mets have played over 10,000 games and we’re the first ones to do this,” Nimmo said, rounding up. “That’s pretty special.”
Mets star shortstop Francisco Lindor missed his fourth straight game because of a sore back.
Luis Severino (11–6) gave up three runs and five hits in six innings with seven strikeouts and two walks.
Walker (3–7) made his first start since Aug. 28 after being relegated to three bullpen appearances. He gave up a career-worst four homers along with eight runs, eight hits, three walks and a hit batter in 3 1/3 innings.
“It just didn’t work out,” Phillies manager Rob Thomson said. “My fault.”
Walker’s ERA rose to 6.91 in an outing that included his 1,000th strikeout.
“It hasn’t been a good year for me,” he told reporters. “I thought there was a little bit more uptick today, but didn’t execute, didn’t get ahead. When I got two strikes, I didn’t put guys away. Just not getting it done right now at all.”
Philadelphia pitchers walked a season-high eight.
New York’s J.D. Martinez went 0 for 4 and is hitless in his last 28 at-bats.
On the 100th anniversary of the birth of Mets broadcaster Bob Murphy, Vientos put the Mets ahead with his 25th homer, a 113.2 mph line drive down the left-field line. Four pitches later, Alonso hit an opposite-field drive to right-center for his 34th homer, giving the Mets back-to-back long balls for the sixth time this season.
Turner tied the score in the third with his 19th homer, driving the ball 436 feet into the left-field second deck.
Six pitches into the bottom half, Nimmo put the Mets ahead with a 21st home, a two-run drive to right-center. Brandon Marsh’s RBI single closed the Phillies to 4–3 in the fourth, but Alvarez hit his third homer in six starts, a three-run drive in a five-run fourth that boosted the lead to 7–3. Nimmo added an RBI double and scored on Vientos’ single.
