MIAMI _ Maybe Jacob deGrom can get even better.
For his latest feat, the Mets' ace dominated the Marlins for seven shutout innings, plus hit the second home run of his career, in a 6-4 win Wednesday night to complete the three-game sweep. He struck out a career-high 14 and allowed three hits and one walk.
Combined with RBI extra-base hits from Amed Rosario, Pete Alonso and Robinson Cano, deGrom's all-around masterpiece was plenty for another Mets victory, the finishing touch on a 5-1 season-opening road trip ahead of their first game at Citi Field at 1 p.m. Thursday.
Closer Edwin Diaz got the final out for his third save (and fourth appearance in six games) after Luis Avilan and Robert Gsellman couldn't get it done in the ninth. They combined to allow four runs, turning a blowout into another close one.
With deGrom not pitching again for a week _ due to off days Friday and Monday _ manager Mickey Callaway pushed him to 114 pitches. His final frame: JT Riddle strikeout swinging, Lewis Brinson strikeout swinging, Chad Wallach strikeout swinging. DeGrom's penultimate pitch was a 97.9-mph fastball a tad outside. He followed up with an 88.3-mph changeup that got Wallach to whiff.
Only one Marlin got as far as second base against deGrom: Rosell Herrera, who was credited with a double when Rosario dropped and kicked Herrera's bloop to the lip of the outfield grass behind second base in the fifth inning.
An overview of deGrom's noteworthy numbers:
_ Wednesday was deGrom's 26th consecutive quality start (at least six innings, three runs or fewer). That ties Bob Gibson (1967-68) for the longest such streak in major-league history.
_ DeGrom racked up double-digit strikeouts in each of his first two starts, the first pitcher in Mets history to do so. He's has 24 in those 13 innings.
_ DeGrom is up to 26 consecutive scoreless innings dating to last season, a personal best (topping his 241/3-inning run in early 2018).
_ For 31 straight starts, deGrom has allowed three runs or fewer, extending his own major league record.
The game was an ordinary one until the top of the third, when deGrom crushed a first-pitch fastball from Trevor Richards (six innings, three runs) into the Mets' bullpen in right field. His only other homer came July 18, 2017, at Citi Field against the Nationals.
Between deGrom's half-innings of excellence, the Mets' hitters did what they so often failed to do last year: support him by scoring runs.
In the second, Keon Broxton started a two-out mini-rally with a hard single. Rosario tripled to right-center to bring him home.
Moments after deGrom's homer (and Brandon Nimmo's walk), Pete Alonso doubled off the top of the left-field wall to score Nimmo. It was nearly Alonso's second homer, but the ball bounced off the corner of the wall and back onto the field.
Cano laced a seventh-inning double into the left-field corner, bringing Alonso in from first.
