What does Christian Scott [1] have in common with Bob Moorhead, Chris Schwinden, Brent Strom, Mike Birkbeck, Collin McHugh and Tommy Milone? They are the only pitchers in Mets history to start at least five games as a Met and never record a victory as a Met starter. Scott holds the record by a mile, with the no-decision he racked up Sunday in Miami serving as his fifteenth start in search of a win. The previous markholder was Moorhead, who never won in seven Met starts. Schwinden tried his luck six times. The others listed took five shots at a W. Honestly, Christian resides in an undesired statistical league of his own here, but I didn’t want him to feel as if he’s the only Met something like this ever happened to.
Unlike his predecessors in this category, Scott still has a chance to win a start for the Mets. Or he would if the Mets didn’t go about their business so Metsishly.
In his fifteenth career start as a Met, Christian was as good as he’s ever been, going five-and-two-thirds innings and allowing no runs. He could have departed as the pitcher of record on the winning side had his teammates given him one run with which to work. They did not. He shouldn’t take it personally. The Mets were shut out for the sixth time in 2026. In 23 of their 53 games to date, the Mets have scored no more than two runs. They are 1-22 in those contests. Christian Scott did not start all of them.
Sunday’s game stayed nothing-nothing from the top of the first clear to the bottom of the ninth. If Scott was on his game, so was everybody else who pitched for both sides. It was a good day most of the day to be someone who threw the ball. Like Scott. Like Huascar Brazobán, Brooks Raley, and Luke Weaver, who blanked the Marlins for a combined two-and-a-third. Like A.J. Ewing, who fired a strike from center to home to cut down the Marlins’ most imminent scoring threat, nailing Javier Sanoja running from second.
The arms had it. The bats didn’t. Maybe there was mound wizardry afoot from Tyler Phillips, Calvin Faucher, John King, Anthony Bender, Michael Petersen, and Pete Fairbanks, too. The piscine sextet must have done something right to notch nine scoreless innings. My guess is the Marlin hurlers held a meeting and voted to face Met hitters. Joke was on them, as the Mets don’t seem to have any hitters, just players tasked with hitting. Those tasks went largely unfulfilled, with the Mets gathering five hits all of Sunday. That’s both not very many and the most they put together in any of their three weekend games.
The bottom of the ninth’s trajectory seemed inevitable. Devin Williams, so good for so long, may have been due for an off outing, though if we’re invoking the “due” theory, the Mets players tasked with hitting were due to do something/anything, thus maybe due had nothing to do with it. Williams gave up a leadoff double to Christopher Morel, wearing only one thick schmear of eyeblack on each side of his face instead of his usual two thin whiskerlike lines that make him look like positively feline. Every time Morel bats, I announce to my wife, “Hey, it’s the kitty cat guy!” I wonder if he changed his cosmetic approach in order to appear more fierce. If he did, that Morel cat sure knew what he was doing.
A pinch-runner, a sac bunt to third, a walk that wavered in its intentions (three-and-oh; full count; ball four), and a fully intentional walk loaded the bases. There was one out. The Met infield was in. The Met outfield was in. The pitch Williams threw Heriberto Hernandez traveled too deep for any Met to catch, particularly once it cleared the fence. What left the bat as a harmful fly ball turned into an ostentatious walkoff grand slam. Once a Met loss was ensured [2], it didn’t matter — except to Devin’s ERA — that the final was 4-0 rather than 1-0, except losing by a final of 4-0 understates the futility of the Met afternoon. It was a game more futile than the final score suggests. Losing by four makes the defeat sound a little too routine, whereas 1-0 really makes the zero pop.
I’ve watched the Mets score very little or not at all nearly two-dozen times these past two months. I’m becoming a connoisseur in the ways of coming up empty.