Mets chase Pirates' Paul Skenes in the first inning in Opening Day win
Mets rookie Carson Benge jumps in the air after homering during the sixth inning of his major-league debut on Opening Day at Citi Field on Thursday. Credit: Newsday/Thomas A. Ferrara
The Mets beat the Pirates, 11-7, on Opening Day at Citi Field on Thursday, but among the offensive pyrotechnics came two unexpectedly pivotal at-bats — a fly ball and a strikeout, both courtesy of new third baseman Bo Bichette.
The fly ball — a sacrifice fly, actually — came during a five-run first in which the Mets stunningly knocked out Cy Young Award winner Paul Skenes before the end of the inning after it took him 35 pitches to record his second out.
With Juan Soto and Francisco Lindor on first and third, Bichette fell behind 0-and-2 but didn’t succumb, muscling off a 97.9-mph fastball foul before skying a changeup to right to cut the Mets’ deficit to 2-1.
The strikeout came in a three-run fifth when, with the bases loaded and one out, Bichette battled reliever Isaac Mattson for 13 pitches before whiffing.
“I wrote that down because even though he struck out, then we see a four-pitch walk right away to [Jorge] Polanco right behind him,” Carlos Mendoza said. “He’s going to make him work. We’ve got a lot of guys that are going to grind at-bats, and that was the perfect example. Even if we didn’t get the results we wanted in that particular situation, other guys benefit from it.”
To be clear, there were plenty of other big highlights Thursday: Carson Benge hit a home run in his major-league debut and stole a base. Francisco Alvarez went back-to-back with Benge, hitting a shot into the second deck in left. Luis Robert Jr. went 2-for-4 with a run, two RBIs and a walk. Brett Baty contributed a three-run triple in the big first inning.
But Mendoza highlighted those two outs for a reason.
Every Opening Day brings the erasure of last year’s sins, and in the case of the new-look Mets, this win was as emphatic an indicator of that as anything. They looked utterly removed from the 2025 team, particularly thanks to their deep lineup, disciplined approach and ability to string together enough quality at-bats to sustain a rally.
“I think even the at-bats that ended in strikeouts, we battled really, really hard,” Baty said. “All through the lineup, I feel like we were super-scrappy today.”
Freddy Peralta allowed two homers by Brandon Lowe but was good enough to hold it together, allowing four runs and six hits with no walks and seven strikeouts in five innings.
It began in inauspicious fashion. Oneil Cruz blooped a leadoff single off Peralta and Lowe unleashed on a first-pitch hanging curveball, driving it 337 feet to right just over Benge’s outstretched glove for a two-run homer.
With Skenes on the mound, even those two runs seemed like a challenge.
They were not.
The Mets battered a wild Skenes in a first inning that would lead you to suspect the Pirates were cursed.
After Bichette’s sacrifice fly, Polanco’s swinging bunt put runners on first and second. Robert walked to load the bases and Baty smashed a 369-foot drive to center that was badly misjudged by Cruz for a three-run triple. Marcus Semien hit a fly ball to center that Cruz lost in the sun, and what was scored a double made it 5-2.
The scoring that inning ended there, but the indignities the Pirates suffered did not. Skenes hit Alvarez and was pulled with two outs in the first. He allowed five runs, four hits and two walks, throwing 37 pitches.
“Just competitive” is how Bichette described it. “I think the goal of our team should be to [put together] the most competitive at-bats every day.”
The Pirates cut their deficit to 6-4 in the fifth before the Mets put up a three-spot. They loaded the bases against Mason Montgomery and Mattson to bring up Soto, who singled sharply through the left side of the infield to drive in a run. They got another on Polanco’s bases-loaded walk and the third on Robert’s infield single.
Benge, who walked and scored his first run in the fifth, got his big moment in the sixth, slamming a sweeper from Justin Lawrence that got all of the plate into the home bullpen in right for his first hit (and his first MLB curtain call). Alvarez got in on the party, too, hitting a second-decker to put the Mets up 11-5.
Along the way, there were some positive signs on defense: In the second, Bichette, in his first major-league game at third, handled a tough grounder from Henry Davis. His throw was far wide, but Polanco, who’d played only one at-bat at first base before Thursday, came off the bag and was able to make the catch and apply the tag. Robert made a nice tumbling catch in center later that inning and, more importantly for the injury-ravaged outfielder, popped up unscathed.
“It’s 162,” Mendoza said. “There are going to be times when it’s going to be hard. That’s the nature of our business. But just to see it out of the gate against one of the best pitchers in the league, it goes to show you we’ve got some dangerous guys there.”
Notes & quotes: The Mets signed outfielder Tommy Pham to a minor-league deal, a source confirmed. Pham, who played with the Mets for 79 games in 2023, is a career .256 hitter and had a .245/.330/.370 slash line with the Pirates last year, recording 10 homers and 52 RBIs in 120 games.
Laura Albanese is the Mets beat writer for Newsday. She's been covering MLB since 2014 after starting at Newsday as an intern seven years earlier.
