Juan Soto’s sixth-inning blast gives Mets the answer every time Phillies threatened

New York’s first punch changed the whole night

The Phillies spent the rest of the evening trying to repay a debt they took on in the opening inning. Francisco Lindor crossed on Carson Benge’s single to left, and A.J. Ewing followed with the hit that really framed the game, a single to center that brought home both Benge and Bo Bichette for a 3-0 Mets lead. Philadelphia used 32 pitches to get through just one-third of an inning from Tim Mayza, and that immediate damage made every later at-bat feel like catch-up work.

To Philadelphia’s credit, the game did not spin completely out of reach. Bryson Stott doubled in Edmundo Sosa in the second to get one run back, and Jose Urquidy gave the Phillies a genuine stabilizing stretch with 4 2/3 scoreless innings and six strikeouts. That mattered, because it kept the score at 3-1 long enough for the Phillies to imagine a late turn.

But the comeback never looked fully formed. The Phillies finished with only six hits, only one walk and an on-base percentage of .229, and four familiar middle-order names never got the offense moving: Bryce Harper, Luis Arraez, Alec Bohm and J.T. Realmuto combined to go 0-for-16. Sosa did everything he could, going 3-for-3 with a homer and two runs scored, and Derek Hill added a later solo shot, yet too much of Philadelphia’s attack lived in isolated moments instead of sustained pressure.

Soto supplied the clean answer

For a few minutes in the sixth, the game finally tilted toward tension. Sosa’s homer to left-center, measured at 377 feet, cut the Mets’ lead to 3-2 and gave Philadelphia its clearest path back into the night. The problem for the Phillies was that New York answered in the same inning, and answered emphatically. Soto drove a 428-foot homer to center, scoring Marcus Semien and Luis Torrens with him, and the scoreboard moved in one swing from a one-run game back to a 6-2 Mets cushion.

That swing was the headline, but it sat inside a broader Mets lineup effort that kept producing traffic. Soto finished 3-for-5 with three RBIs. Lindor had two hits and scored once. Benge went 2-for-3 with an RBI and a run. Ewing drove in two. Bichette, Mark Vientos, Semien, Brett Baty and Torrens all added hits, giving New York contributions from every spot in the starting order. The Phillies threw 151 pitches because the Mets kept extending innings.

There was one slightly odd quality to all that offense: New York’s hit total suggested an even larger outburst than six runs. The Mets left 20 men on base, so this was not a night of flawless conversion. It was a night of relentless table-setting, then a few decisive finishes. The first inning did the early damage; Soto’s homer delivered the clearest finishing blow.

Our take: a solid Mets formula, and a clear Phillies warning

Our take: the Mets gave themselves a template worth trusting. Zac Thornton worked six innings, allowed five hits and two earned runs, walked one and threw 87 pitches, which is exactly the kind of start that lets a productive lineup matter. Nate Lavender did give up Hill’s solo homer in the seventh, but Dedniel Nunez closed the final 1 1/3 innings without allowing a hit, and New York’s staff as a whole limited Philadelphia to six hits and one walk. For one game, that is a sturdy formula: enough contact suppression, very few free bases, and one star swing to separate things.

Our take: both clubs still left obvious cleanup work behind them. For the Mets, 13 hits, two walks and a hit batter should probably feel better than six runs and 20 stranded runners, so there is room for sharper finishing even in a win. For the Phillies, the lesson is blunter. They allowed 13 hits, two walks and a hit batter, and their best offensive work came from Sosa and Hill supplying solo home runs. When Harper strikes out three times, the club draws only one walk, and the core of the order goes quiet, the margin for a pitching stumble disappears. Friday’s result looked like that in plain view: New York created more offense, spread it across the lineup, and had the immediate answer every time Philadelphia hinted at a push.

Scoring moments

1. 1st Inning

   Benge singled to left, Lindor scored, Bichette to second.

2. 1st Inning

   Ewing singled to center, Benge scored and Bichette scored, Ewing to second, Vientos to third.

3. 2nd Inning

   Stott doubled to center, Sosa scored.

4. 6th Inning

   Sosa homered to left center (377 feet).

5. 6th Inning

   Soto homered to center (428 feet), Semien scored and Torrens scored.

6. 7th Inning

   Hill homered to left (408 feet).