Jacob deGrom, meet run support.
It may be a bit of a foreign concept, especially when it comes as early as it did Thursday, but it was a welcome one for deGrom, who took the lead and ran with it.
The Mets pushed across four runs in the bottom of the first and deGrom took care of the rest on the way to a 4-0 win over the Padres to take the series at Citi Field.
Leaning heavily on a slider that he threw 56 times (out of 105 pitches), used to finish off seven of his nine strikeouts and even made an opposing hitter fall over swinging at it, deGrom tossed seven shutout innings.