A nightful of strange occurrences.
The first pinch hit homer of his career became the first walk-off homer of his career and the winning homer of the game as Chris Woodward's two run shot in the 11th gave the Mets an improbable victory over the NL West-leading San Diego Padres at Shea.
And pinch me because I know this was a dream and is no semblance of reality but was that Mike Piazza throwing out the NL leading base stealer Dave Roberts at 2nd base in the 8th inning??! Let's rewind and replay. Mike Piazza throwing out not just ANY runner, but the NL leading base stealer, at second place, on less than three hops! Wow. That's a victory all in and of itself, only the 8th runner out of 66 to get caught stealing by Piazza.
The victory was improbable in that it was almost the precise blueprint for the sort of games they lost during their vile and spiritless trip out West against the A's and Mariners - decent pitching, plebian hitting and one timely opponent run after another to bury them in losses.
But not this time. This time they got the decent pitching from Kris Benson who threw 7 innings of 5 hit, one run ball to keep the Mets close. They got the plebian hitting from the top three in the lineup who gave a 1 for 13 performance. But instead of seeing the bullpen give up just that one tiny run that makes all the difference between a win and a loss, they held this time and waited instead for the Padres bullpen to give in.
After the Mets put runners in scoring position in the 5th through the 10th innings with nothing to show for it, it was impossible to ignore the negative moment building like a losing crescendo, a tsunami of blown chances, their season in a nutshell.
Yet instead, just as you thought the script could be written in their sleep, Woodward and the Mets rewrote it with the funny, new angle: how about an extra-inning homerun that wins the game?
Nice one, fellas.
Can you do it again tomorrow?
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