Bob P
March 7, 2004
Tom Glavine threw a complete game six-hitter to win this game for the Braves. He did not walk or strike out anyone, and threw just 79 pitches in nine innings.

The one Met run came on Darrin Jackson's only home run as a Met.

Dave VW
February 6, 2023
This was such a typical Tom Glavine mid-1990s performance. He was completely hittable but he had line drives hit right at people, somehow maneuvering through a 79-pitch complete game with no walks or strikeouts by taking advantage of a team that put the first pitch of an at-bat into play 13 times (10 if you don't count sacrifice bunts). No Met had an at-bat lasting over 5 pitches the whole game. According to my research on baseball reference, it's the fewest pitches in a 9-inning complete game ever against the Mets...though accurate pitch counts weren't consistently kept track of until the 1990s, so who really knows. But, only three pitchers have managed to pull off a no-walk, no-strikeout, 9-inning complete game since Glavine: Pedro Astacio in 1994, Joel Pineiro in 2006, and Rick Porcello in 2014. So yeah, it's pretty rare.

As Bob wrote, Darrin Jackson was the only batter to hang a run on Glavine with his lone Met home run. Meanwhile, Saberhagen had a dandy of a game himself, as he only allowed a Sid Bream homer during his 8 innings. The Mets just missed handing him the lead in the top of the 8th, too. Saberhagen himself led off with a single and moved to 2nd on a sac bunt by Coleman. Doug Saunders, playing in just his third career major league game, seemed to give himself up rather than going for the go-ahead hit, as he tapped out weakly to 2B in order to move Saberhagen to third. Murray, up next, worked the count to 2-0 before jumping all over a pitch that landed just a couple feet foul down the left field line. So close! A few pitches later, he flew out to left and that was that.

In the bottom of the 9th, Saberhagen had reached 100 pitches and came out in favor of Eric Hillman, making his second-to-last relief appearance of the season. Jeff Blauser greeted him with a lead-off infield single and was sacrificed to 2nd by Pendleton. Justice then pounded a grounder to first which Murray knocked down but the ball bounced too far away from him to get the out. Even if he fielded it cleanly, I don't think he or Hillman were going to beat Justice to the bag anyway. Here's when I start to question Dallas Green's strategy. Right-hand hitting Ron Gant up next and a double play away from getting out of the inning, he could have intentionally walked Gant to load the bases and face Sid Bream lefty-on-lefty, which the Braves would have countered by going with a righty off the bench. At which point, the Mets could have turned to a righty out of the pen, like Innis or Maddux, and gotten the better matchup. Perhaps the Braves would have pinch hit again and gone with Otis Nixon or some other lefty, but I'd at least force the Braves to have to react to my moves. Or perhaps just bring in a righty to face Gant and take your chances. Instead, Green brings in Franco to intentionally walk Gant (I never like bringing in a pitcher who is then asked to intentionally walk his first batter -- let the pitcher being taken out do that!), and the Braves do what you expect and pinch hit with Hunter for Bream, getting the righty-vs.-lefty matchup. Working the count full, Hunter hits a flyball to center that scores the winning run. Maybe Jackson had a chance to get him out at home, but we'll never know because for some unknown reason Murray cut the ball off near the mound. Who knows why, but it probably didn't matter anyway.

I looked at Franco's numbers in June. He had no saves, two blown saves, and the Mets lost 6 of the 8 games he appeared in. Simply awful.