LOS ANGELES — Phil Maton cut off the question before it was finished.
“How did they feel?” he repeated when asked about the final four innings. “Stressful.”
Mets fans can agree. Recording the final 12 outs of Monday’s NLCS-knotting 7-3 win at Dodger Stadium surely caused anxiety but also plenty of pride from a bullpen group that picked each other up.
Maton inherited a jam from Sean Manaea and allowed two runs to score through little fault of his own.
After pitching well, Maton left a jam for Ryne Stanek, who pitched his way out of trouble and then pitched his way into trouble.
That’s when he handed the baton to Edwin Diaz, who extinguished that fire and then blew out his own fire in the ninth inning.
After it was all done, three Mets relievers had combined to stitch together four innings in which they were not charged with a run. None was perfect — they all allowed at least a hit and all walked at least one — but each one walked into trouble and survived.
“A lot of guys take a lot of pride in trying to help the previous guy out,” Stanek said. “And it was just a situation where everybody felt that. I think as a bullpen, you feel good when you can kind of stop the bleeding for somebody else.”
It was Manaea bleeding in the sixth inning, having walked two batters and watching Jose Iglesias bungle a potential double-play ball that loaded the bases.
“Crazy situation. Bases loaded, no outs,” Manaea said. “I got the utmost confidence in the boys back in there in the bullpen.”
Maton executed, getting Will Smith to pop up and inducing a ground ball from Tommy Edman, but Pete Alonso failed to snag or knock down the grounder that became a two-run single.
After a Max Muncy walk, Maton got yet another batted ball headed south, which Mark Vientos and Iglesias skillfully turned into an inning-ending double play.
Maton issued a one-out walk to Shohei Ohtani in the seventh, which was a bit of danger he allowed Stanek to handle.
The fireballer struck out Mookie Betts on three pitches before getting a groundout from Teoscar Hernandez to leave Ohtani on first.
An inning later, Stanek served up a single to Edman and walked Muncy. With two outs, it was Diaz who entered to face Kike Hernandez, who represented the potential tying run. Diaz threw four sliders, the fourth going for an exhale of a fly out.
“That’s why he is who he is,” Stanek said of Diaz.
Diaz flexed who he is — warts and all — in the ninth, when Andy Pages singled and Ohtani walked to begin the inning.
But Diaz blew away Betts, Teoscar Hernandez and Freeman, all striking out predominantly on heat.
“In the ninth I tried to throw strikes, attack the hitters because we were winning by four runs,” Diaz said. “I got a good lead to challenge them. That’s what I did.”
The three relievers combined to allow seven base runners in four scoreless innings.
“They did a hell of a job,” Carlos Mendoza said of his bullpen.