The Mets defeated the Yankees 4-0 tonight, with a standard-issue stressful ninth inning.
The Mets got a run off of Javy Vazquez early when David Wright doubled with 2 outs and Ike Davis singled him home. Wright made a good slide around the tag of Francisco Cervelli, who was poorly positioned on the play.
Hisanori Takahashi (6-2) was again brilliant against the Yankees, pitching 6 scoreless, striking out 3, walking 2, and allowing 4 hits. He got out of a bases-loaded jam in the sixth thanks to a great barehanded field-and-throw by David Wright.
Both managers did their best to try to lose the game tonight. In a 1-0 game, Joe Girardi brought in Chan Ho Park to pitch, and he got just one out and ended up allowing 2 runs. Boone Logan came in and was not much better, allowing a run, but he got David Wright to ground into a double play to end the threat in the eighth.
Jerry Manuel actually did a good job with his bullpen early. Elmer Dessens allowed a leadoff double to the hated Francisco Cervelli, and Jerry brought in Pedro Feliciano. Pedro then struck out Granderson, grounded out Gardner, and did the same to Jeter.
The Mets scored 2 in the eighth thanks to a leadoff walk by Ruben Tejada (as mentioned, against Park), a Reyes double, and a Pagan double to make it 3-0. In the bottom of the inning, Feliciano allowed a leadoff single to Swisher but got Teixeira to fly out, struck out A-Rod on a beautiful backdoor slider, and flew out Robinson Cano.
In the top of the ninth, the Mets got an insurance run on a Jose Reyes single that followed a one-out Francoeur double and Tejada single. Pagan walked, but then Wright grounded into the double play I mentioned.
Gangsta Jerry then decided to turn to Raul Valdes with a 4-run lead, who had not retired a batter in his previous 2 appearances (the last one June 13). He got the leadoff batter Posada, but allowed singles to Cervelli and Granderson. So the tying run was on deck, so it was save situation and K-Rod time.
Frankie got ahead of Brett Gardner 0-2, but Gardner eventually walked in an 11-pitch at bat in which he fouled off countless fastballs (K-Rod didn’t throw him a breaking ball). With the bases loaded, Frankie struck out Jeter on three pitches, and popped up Nick Swisher on the first pitch to “put it in the books.”
So now the Mets are 39-28, winners of 8 straight, 7 on the road, and are on a 19-5 run. Wow. Honestly, no one can say they expected this.
Win one of the next two, and holy moley, we’ll have something interesting on our hands.
