Luis Severino dominates red-hot Royals to pick up first Mets win
Facing the Royals, Luis Severino emerged as the king of Queens.
Severino delivered the best start of his short Mets career Friday against baseball’s hottest team, limiting surging Kansas City to one run on one hit to pick up his first win of the season.
The right-hander struck out four in the Mets’ 6-1 victory at Citi Field, at one point retiring eight Royals in a row.
He issued four walks but managed to work out of multiple jams, including in his final inning, which he ended with a swinging strikeout of red-hot Bobby Witt Jr. with two runners on base to preserve a 3-1 lead.
The lone blemish against Severino came on a second-inning solo home run by Salvador Perez.
“I thought he found a rhythm,” Mets manager Carlos Mendoza said of Severino. “I thought the sweeper was good, the fastball was good.”
It was an encouraging outing for Severino, who signed a one-year prove-it deal with the Mets in the offseason following a disappointing 2023 campaign with the crosstown Yankees.
Severino surrendered six runs (three earned) on 11 hits over five innings against the Brewers in his first start of the season, then gave up two runs (one earned) on three hits in five innings last week against the Reds. The Mets lost both games.
The 30-year-old Severino spent his first eight MLB seasons with the Yankees, emerging as their ace from 2017-18 behind an upper-90s fastball and a put-away slider.
Injuries, however, derailed much of Severino’s Yankees tenure, including in 2023, when a lat strain and an upper body ailment limited him to 19 appearances. He dealt with inconsistency between those injuries, pitching to a career-worst 6.65 ERA, with the first inning often being his bugaboo.
“The main thing is I’m healthy,” Severino, who threw 90 pitches, said Friday. “I feel good.”
The Mets gave Severino (1-1, 3.00 ERA) plenty of run support Friday, with Brandon Nimmo providing an RBI double in the third inning; Jeff McNeil and D.J. Stewart adding RBI singles in the fourth; and Bretty Baty breaking the game open with a two-run double in the fifth.
All five of those runs came against Royals starter Michael Wacha, who pitched for the Mets in 2020.
Pete Alonso added an insurance run with a solo home run in the eighth inning, marking his fourth homer of the season. The Mets recorded 14 hits to the Royals’ three.
The loss snapped a seven-game winning streak for the Royals, who fell to 9-5. The Mets, who have won six of eight games since beginning the season 0-5, improved to 6-7.
A sparse Citi Field crowd gave struggling shortstop Francisco Lindor a nice ovation during his first at-bat, heeding the advice of Mets owner Steve Cohen. Lindor, who entered the game hitting .098, went 1-for-3 to boost his average to .111.
“It fills my heart, for sure,” said Lindor, who also drew a walk. “I appreciated the way they came out and showed some love, not only for me, but for my teammates as well.”
This weekend’s three-game series marks a rematch of the 2015 World Series, which the Royals won in five games.
The Mets’ Sean Manaea (1-0, 0.82 ERA) is set to start Saturday afternoon’s game against Kansas City’s Alec Marsh (1-0, 3.09 ERA).
