Mets' Frankie Montas confident with progress, pitch movement after longest outing of season

Frankie Montas fell just short of becoming the second Mets starter to complete an outing of six-plus innings over the last month, but that's neither here nor there. His job was to keep the game close, and that task was accomplished.

While the veteran right-hander's performance didn't include style points, it was still a winning effort, as his 5.2 frames of two-run ball with a season-best six strikeouts helped the Mets rally to a 3-2 win over the Angels on Tuesday night at Citi Field.

"I threw some good splitters, good sweepers, good sliders. I thought I had a nice amount of pitches working tonight," Montas said after the game. "I feel pretty good. I would've loved to finish the sixth inning, though. But step by step, I definitely feel better and better every time I step on the mound. I feel like my pitches are moving better.

"I'm getting more movement, more strikes. I keep making progress every start… The first two innings, I thought I was missing my location. I tried to throw my pitches in a better spot after that. Things were working better after that."

Montas flirted with trouble from the jump, allowing a first-inning double and then a single to Mike Trout that fortunately resulted in Nolan Schanuel being tagged out on a bang-bang play at the plate.

In the second, he surrendered a two-out, no-doubt solo homer to Jorge Soler that broke the ice, and Schanuel managed to get some revenge with an RBI double in the fifth that bumped the Angels' lead to 2-0.

But Montas retired eight straight batters at one point, and although he left the mound trailing with eight hits allowed, he ultimately earned his third win of the campaign with a boost from the Mets' bats.

"I thought he was good. I thought the secondary pitches were good," Mets manager Carlos Mendoza said of Montas. "He used all of them in the strike zone, expanded when he needed to. He's got to be able to compete in the strike zone with the secondaries — whether it's the split, the slider, the sweeper. The cutter elevated against a couple of lefties.

"The other good sign for me was, he was able to reach 97 [mph] in that sixth inning to get Soler for strike three in the top of the zone. That's a good sign. For him to reach there at 90 pitches, it was really good to see. So, a very good outing and very good step for him."

Montas, who threw 58 of a season-high 91 pitches for strikes, now owns a 4.62 ERA and 1.30 WHIP (five starts) since coming off the injured list in late June. He also has a strikeout-walk ratio of 23-to-6 across 25.1 innings, and his reliability will be put to the test next week in a scheduled road matchup with the Padres.

Read the full article here