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Playing without star shortstop Jose Reyes, who will miss 3-7 days on bereavement leave to mourn the loss of his paternal grandmother, the New York Mets still found a way to pound out 15 hits and beat the visiting Pittsburgh Pirates 7-3 in the opener of a four-game series. Josh Thole’s two-run double in the bottom of the seventh broke open a 3-3 game and put the Mets ahead for good.

While rumors have had Reyes being traded sometime this season before becoming a free agent next offseason, the Dominican shortstop has been having a career year for the mediocre Mets. Reyes leads the majors in hits (76), multi-hit games (26) and triples (8), is tied for the Major League lead in steals (19), and leads the National League in doubles (17).  He has a six-game hitting streak going, and is hitting .519 over that span.

The Mets are also missing injured David Wright and Ike Davis, but for at least one night found enough offense to fill the holes in their lineup. Angel Pagan, Ruben Tejada and Daniel Murphy each had three hits as the Mets improved to 25-28, still 8.5 games behind the first-place Phillies in the NL East.  “We’ve got to play with that we’ve got,” said Pagan. “Jose is our best player, but we’ve got his back.”

Dillon Gee gave up three runs over seven inning while striking out a career-high eight batters to improve to 5-0 on the season. The Pirates are now 0-8 all-time at Citi Field.