Mets 2, Rockies 1

(7-4, 1st place, up on Philadelphia by 1 game)

It’s been really fun to watch these first few Marcus Stroman starts.

He’s been dominant against the Phillies and the Rockies.

The seventh inning on Sunday was particularly fun to watch - after Trevor Story doubled and Charlie Blackmon singled him home with one out, Stroman struck out the next two batters.

The way he has been pitching there was almost no doubt he was going to get those two batters - it was just a matter of how - a ground ball to induce a double play?

It turned out he dialed it up a little bit and got two Ks.

The Mets scattered some hits throughout the afternoon, but couldn’t really piece together any rallies. It’s a little unsatisfying when you’re playing at Coors Field and expect an offensive explosion, but at the same time it wasn’t discouraging.

The runs came early - a first inning manufactured run on a groundout, and a J.D. Davis RBI single in the 4th.

All told it was 8 innings and 1 run on 3 hits for Stroman.

Edwin Diaz looked pretty good again to get the save.

And the final out was recorded when James McCann made maybe his best play so far with the Mets, gunning down Trevor Story trying to steal second base.

When you play a team like the Rockies, who right now have the worst record in all of baseball, you’re supposed to win. It really doesn’t matter if it’s 2-1 or 11-1, just get the win.

The Mets did that, taking two out of three in Colorado.

And right now they look like a really strong baseball team.

Just like we expected coming into this season.

Notes: Nice to see: Michael Conforto seems to have found his stroke in Colorado - just ground balls finding holes, but it’s a step up from last week. Power is next. (Not to mention his luck really seems to be changing - he misplayed a fly ball in the 5th inning but was able to recover and make a diving catch. Let’s hope all of this continues the rest of the season.)…Not nice to see: Francisco Lindor had a weird 8th inning at-bat - he kept shaking or blowing on his hand? Not sure which one - it could have just been a cold weather stinger on the bat, but it might be something more along the lines of an injury. That’s the trouble with limited cameras because of COVID regulations, and with a road game, relying on mostly home cameras. The Rockies cameras didn’t focus on it so we don’t have a lot of information right now. We did see him catch two liners after this and make the tag on the caught stealing and that all looked fine…Yesterday I was critical of Albert Almora rounding third on the game-tying run in game one of the Saturday doubleheader. They talked about it on Sunday’s pre-game and had an isolated camera on him. I was wrong. It was fine. I guess maybe it was just how they cut to it…Mets have another off day Monday, and then they’ll be in Chicago where - you guessed it - more nasty weather greets them on Tuesday.

How I Watched: Just an SNY Sunday.

What Else I Watched: I watched a little bit of the Yankees-Rays because Ryan Yarbrough was pitching and he’s on my fantasy team. Then I thought, wait a second, I don’t remember seeing Yarbrough scheduled to start this game…did I remember to start him? Turns out I had him active, which was good, but he didn't get the little Yahoo! arrow indicating a start because the Rays used an opener. Those sneaky Rays. Fantasy tip: Don’t bench your Rays starters - you never know what they’ll do.

Notes From Around The League: I wasn’t paying close attention to the west coast games the past couple of days - caught up on Sunday morning to learn the Angels-Twins games on Saturday and Sunday were postponed for COVID reasons. The Twins will also not play their Monday game against Oakland…Also out west, the Dodgers-Padres not only had some tense moments, but also a huge diving catch by Mookie Betts to end Saturday’s game…I delivered some big news in my Sunday Paper Sunday morning, if you’re interested in that sort of thing.