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Homers help Mets top Twins, gain WC ground
- Updated: September 17, 2016
NEW YORK — The Mets returned to Citi Field for their final homestand on Friday in an enviable position. With a one-game cushion in the National League Wild Card race and the NL’s easiest schedule before them, they held control of their fate. The Mets’ only requirement was to win at least as many games as the next-best teams.
They began that process with a clinical 3-0 win over the Twins that typified the type of team they’ve become. Bartolo Colon gave the Mets seven shutout innings, Jose Reyes and Asdrubal Cabrera hit back-to-back home runs and the Mets never trailed, ensuring they would retain at least a one-game lead over the Cardinals. New York temporarily moved within a half-game of the Giants for the NL’s best Wild Card record.
“I think the mindset is just getting into the postseason right now,” manager Terry Collins said. “We’ve got to just continue to try to win as many games as we can. We made a statement about three weeks ago that we’ve just got to take care of our own business and if we do, we’ll get back in the hunt. Well, we’re in the hunt. Deeply. And that’s all we’ve got to continue to do is not worry about anything else except our business, to try to win a game each and every night.”
Though Twins rookie Jose Berrios managed to extricate himself from a bases-loaded jam in the first inning, the Mets took the lead for good on homers by Reyes and Cabrera in the third. Yoenis Cespedes later added an RBI single off reliever Pat Light.
It was more than enough for Colon, Addison Reed and Jeurys Familia, who held the Twins to just three hits. Minnesota, too, loaded the bases at one point, but Jorge Polanco flew out to end that third-inning threat.
“We really only hit one ball hard,” Twins manager Paul Molitor said, referring to Polanco’s sixth-inning single.
MOMENTS THAT MATTEREDBack to back: The Mets’ reliance on the long ball continued into Friday’s third inning, which Reyes and Cabrera opened with back-to-back shots. After Reyes pulled his seventh home run over the right-field fence, Cabrera obliterated his 20th a projected 394 feet into the …
