Mets Use Long Ball And Jacob deGrom To Shut Down Reds

Pete Alonso hit his 50th home run of the season off Sal Romano with a man in the eighth inning to seal the New York Mets 8-1 win. 

Alonso passed Mark McGwire for the second most home runs by a rookie.  McGwire hit 49 in 1987. The Yankees Aaron Judge holds the rookie record with 52.  No rookie has ever lead the Major Leagues in home runs.  Alonso leads the Reds' Eugenio Suarez by two.

With Luis Castillo for the Reds and Jacob deGrom on the mound for the New York Mets, hits, let alone runs were hard to come by until mid-game.  The Mets scored eight runs from the sixth inning on.

Castillo shut out the Mets on one hit through five innings.  The Reds managed three hits off deGrom.

"We got to see first hand why deGrom is so good," David Bell said.  "I saw really sharp stuff. He had it all going. I saw the same thing with Castillo. He was really good.  You can't do much better than that.  You'd like to have those two pitches back but he was really good."

Castillo knew it would be a challenge from the start.  He wasn't too upset about the homers he gave up.

Jeff McNeil hit his 23rd home run with one out in the sixth to give the New Yorkers a 1-0 lead.  Amed Rosario followed a two-out walk to J.D. Davis with his 14th home run in the seventh.

"I have to give credit to the hitters," Castillo said.  "They were quality pitches.  It was a changeup to McNeil and a slider to Rosario."When you're facing a Cy Young pitcher like that, you have to pitch a really good game to keep yourself and your team in the game."

McNeil's two out double off Keury Mella scored Brandon Nimmo in the ninth.  Juan Lagares andd Michael Conforto added an RBI singles in the ninth.

Castillo gave up just three hits in seven innings but two of them were long balls that tallied the three runs.  Sal Romano took over in the eighth.

Brad Brach replaced deGrom after he threw seven scoreless innings, allowing four harmless singles.  He struck out nine and only threw 96 pitches.

Aristides Aquino's 17th home run of the season off Jeurys Familia allowed the Reds to avoid its 12th shutout.  It was the team's 82 loss which insures them of their sixth straight losing season.