Intrigue lurked here and there among the Mets and Cardinals for seven innings Sunday afternoon... as a baseball fan, you are conditioned to appreciate tautness and tension, and there was a little much action between nothing happening to write this one off as action-challenged.
Quintana needed 26 pitches to get through the first. Given how he labored, it already felt like the Mets were losing. But they weren't. There's inevitably something encouraging about looking up at a game that doesn't seem to be going well, pitched by a starter who's discovered his groove, and realizing your team isn't behind.
The Cardinals mounted a Whiteyball rally in the fifth: double; productive groundout; sac bunt. Except Quintana's groove wasn't all that penetrable. Donovan the fielder didn't drive Michael Siani the bunter in from second, and Willson Contreras the catcher lined out to end any further threat.
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