NEW YORK _ The Mets' defense had been committing too many mistakes and the pitchers had been serving up way too many runs over the first month of the season. The team showed up for work Sunday at Citi Field clinging to the National League's bottom rung in errors and ERA.
So they really needed to play a clean game and get a well-pitched start against the Brewers after the duds thrown in the first two games of the series by Jacob deGrom and Noah Syndergaard.
They got what they needed. Steven Matz turned in a quality start. There were no errors. And when Milwaukee's defense broke down in the seventh, the Mets capitalized for the tiebreaking run and went on to claim a 5-2 win, thereby avoiding a three-game sweep and snapping a three-game skid.
