Schwei: 'Walk-Off' Slams Mets For 10th Time
By John Schweibacher
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Giancarlo Stanton's game-ending grand slam in the bottom of the ninth inning completed the Marlins' come-from-behind 8-4 win over the Mets on Sunday.
It was the 10th time in Mets history that they were victimized by a "walk-off" grand slam:
•5/18/70 at Montreal 8-4 Bob Bailey vs. Cal Koonce
•4/13/83 at Philadelphia 10-9 Bo Diaz vs. Neil Allen
•4/18/87 at St. Louis 12-8 (10) Tom Herr vs. Jesse Orosco
•8/13/93 at Philadelphia 9-5 Kim Batiste vs. Anthony Young
•6/28/01 at Atlanta 6-2 (10) Javy Lopez vs. Armando Benitez
•9/29/01 at Atlanta 8-5 Brian Jordan vs. John Franco
•8/7/09 at San Diego 6-2 Everth Cabrera vs. Francisco Rodriguez
•9/30/09 at Washington 7-4 Justin Maxwell vs. Francisco Rodriguez
•6/2/10 at San Diego 5-1 (11) Adrian Gonzalez vs. Raul Valdes
•5/13/12 at Miami 8-4 Giancarlo Stanton vs. Manny Acosta
(Thanks to ultimatemets.com for its help with the walk-off list.)
David Wright went 4-for-6 in the Mets' 9-3 win at Miami on Saturday, raising his batting average from .387 to .402. Wright went 1-for-3 on Sunday to finish the road trip at an even .400 on the season. According to the Elias Sports Bureau, Wright is the first qualifying Mets batter ever to carry a batting average in the .400s beyond the team's 30th game of the season. Cleon Jones was batting .411 after 30 games in 1969, but he slipped below .400 in his next game.
The Mets host the Brewers and Reds this week in a pair of two-game series at Citi Field.
This will be Milwaukee's only trip to Flushing this season, which may be good news for the Mets since the Brewers have won six straight games at Citi Field dating back to 2010.
The Mets last home win against Milwaukee came in the opener of their four-game set back on September 28th, 2010 when Ruben Tejada's two-run double in the bottom of the ninth inning gave New York a come-from-behind 4-3 victory.
Ryan Braun, the reigning National League MVP, comes into this week's series with a .296 average, two homers and 18 RBI's his 108 career at bats against the Mets.
The Cincinnati Reds make the first of their two trips this season to Citi Field this week. The Reds, who will return to play a three-game series in Flushing next month, have not made two trips to New York to play the Mets since 2000.
Joey Votto, the 2010 National League MVP, has hit .330 (33-for-100), with 11 homers and 24 RBI's in his 27 career games against the Mets.
The Mets will play their first Interleague series of 2012 this weekend when they face the Blue Jays in Toronto.
New York has gone 14 and 4 overall against the Blue Jays in interleague play, going 5 and 4 in Toronto and winning all nine games played at Shea Stadium. The Blue Jays have not come to Citi Field and this weekend's meeting will be the first between the two clubs since 2006. Edgardo Alfonzo, Mike Piazza and Todd Pratt share the Mets' all-time lead with two home runs apiece at Skydome while Bobby Jones is the only Mets pitcher to win twice in Toronto.
According to the Elias Sports Bureau, the Mets' three-game sweep in Philadelphia last week marked just the second time that the team swept a series of at least three games and scored the game-winning run in the seventh inning or later in each contest.
The Mets last did it back on May 16th-19th, 1988, winning four consecutive such games against the Padres in San Diego. Gary Carter's three-run homer off of Greg Booker in the top of the seventh inning was the difference in the 7-4 series opening win. A Mark Davis wild pitch in the top of the seventh allowed the only run to score in the Mets' 1-0 win in the second game. A two-run home run by Keith Hernandez and a two-run double by Howard Johnson highlighted the Mets four-run seventh in a 5-2 victory in the third game of the set and the Mets completed the sweep with another four-run seventh and a three-run ninth in a 9-4 win.
In addition, last week's sweep was the third in team history in which the Mets swept a road series of at least three games despite trailing in each of those games. The others were in July 21st-23rd, 1986 at Cincinnati and August 31st-September 2nd, 1987 at San Diego.
According to the Elias Sports Bureau, for only the second time in team history, the Mets have swept a series of three or more games from three divisional opponents (Braves, Marlins and Phillies) before the end of May. The 1972 Mets swept the Cubs, Expos and Phillies.
Chicago was the Mets' first victim that April. New York took the opener of their three-game series at Shea Stadium and after a rainout, swept a doubleheader to complete the three-game sweep of the Cubs. In mid-May, the Mets swept a four-game set against Montreal in New York and then followed that up with a four-game sweep of the Phillies in Philadelphia.
Of course, last week's sweep might not have happened at all except for Jordany Valdespin's three-run, pinch homer in the opening game off of Jonathan Papelbon that gave the Mets a 5-2 victory. According to Elias, Valdespin became the first player in major-league history whose first career hit was a home run off a pitcher who had 200-or-more saves to his credit.
The last MLB player whose first major-league hit was a go-ahead homer in the ninth inning or later was Miguel Cabrera, whose first hit was a walk-off homer for the Marlins on June 20th, 2003, a two-run, 11th inning shot against Tampa Bay.
Schwei's Runs, Hits and Errors:
Runs: R.A. Dickey. Knuckleballer improves season record to 5 and 1 with 9-3 win over Marlins.
Hits: Mike Baxter. Leads majors with six pinch-hits, hitting .400 in 15 at bats off the bench with five runs batted in.
Errors: Frank Francisco. Pair of blown saves in Miami leaves Mets closer with a 1-3 record and an ERA of 8.56 this season.
How do you think the Mets will fare this week? Make your prediction below...
