Mets Show Long Suit

Here’s the face of the National League Championship Series: New York Mets starter Oliver Perez threw 5 2/3 innings Sunday night, was rocked for three home runs and nine hits, and was practically mobbed by appreciative teammates when he went to the dugout for the last time.

Had one of those 400-foot home runs blown foul, they might have renamed the Triborough Bridge for him.

“I didn’t know what to expect, to tell you the truth,” General Manager Omar Minaya said later. “All I know is I was very pleased.”

So lie the standards of the NLCS, where the Mets tied the series against the St. Louis Cardinals, two victories apiece, with a 12-5 victory at Busch Stadium. Game 5 is tonight. Rain is forecast.

The Mets hit four home runs, two by Carlos Beltran, scored six times in the sixth inning, and generally retook their place as the most feared offensive team of baseball’s postseason. The teams set a league championship series game record with seven home runs, and what remains shocking is each team has thrown a shutout in the series.

The Mets, their offense flatter than the brim of Cardinals starter Anthony Reyes’ cap, hadn’t scored for 14 innings before Beltran’s home run in the third inning, an uncomfortable development when your pitching staff is, to be kind, vulnerable.

As the ball cleared the right-field fence, Shawn Green said, “Everyone in the dugout took a sigh of relief.”

They then set about clobbering the Cardinals, who eventually went through six pitchers. Carlos Delgado drove in five runs, three on a fifth-inning home run and two on a sixth-inning double, both to the opposite field, just like he beat the Dodgers.

By the end of their half of the sixth inning, the Mets led, 11-3, confirming that neither team has the end-to-end pitching to overrun the other, and guaranteeing the series will return to New York, for at least one game.

Reyes, the rookie right-hander from USC, hadn’t pitched in the postseason, and neither had Perez, who was put in play when Pedro Martinez and Orlando Hernandez fell in the final days before the playoffs. Whatever it would be, then, there was ample evidence it wouldn’t be Jack Morris versus John Smoltz.

Reyes threw a lot of pitches early and was gone after the fourth inning, having given up only two runs but walking four. Perez was more hittable, but also more economical, and ultimately survived on run support.

“We had a great approach today at the plate,” Beltran said. “We were letting the guy pitch. We took a few walks and, you know, it felt good, including myself, when I take a walk and have a guy like Carlos behind me who makes the guy pay.”

Beltran, who tortured the Cardinals in the 2004 NLCS, has three home runs in the series, as does Delgado. David Wright also homered for the Mets.

“His swing is looking great right now,” Green said of Beltran. “Everybody knows what he did a couple years ago, and he’s swinging a hot bat again.”

After beginning the series with two hits in 12 at-bats, Beltran reached base five times and scored four times. The offense sprung up around him. The Mets failed to put a runner on base in only one inning -- the eighth -- and were four for seven with runners in scoring position.

David Eckstein, Jim Edmonds and Yadier Molina homered for the Cardinals, who had 11 hits but drew only one walk, to the Mets’ six.

Eckstein homered into the left-field bleachers to lead off the fifth inning, cutting the Cardinals’ deficit to 5-3 and extending one of the curiosities of the series.

That is, So Taguchi, Jeff Suppan and Eckstein each has a home run.

Albert Pujols does not.

He does have four hits, but three are singles. And although he has scored four runs, he hasn’t driven in one.

To illustrate further, Taguchi, Suppan and Eckstein have combined to hit 37 home runs, including the postseason, in their careers.

Pujols hit 49 this season.

And, if Pujols did not believe Glavine was any good in a seven-inning shutout in Game 1, one can only imagine his opinion of the rest of the Mets’ pitchers.

So, through four games of the NLCS, the Mets have scored 20 runs, the Cardinals 19, and the only thing decided is that Glavine will take the ball for the Mets, Jeff Weaver for the Cardinals, and the Detroit Tigers will watch with some interest.

“Sometimes a little luck is involved,” Mets Manager Willie Randolph said. “Sometimes you just feel better on a particular day. So I don’t get caught up in a lot of momentum and all that stuff.

“You can feel it sometimes, you can feel a change, but it doesn’t always stay true.”

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tim.brown@latimes.com