Cubs17 Mets10
CHICAGO – Being alone in first place was a fleeting feeling for the Mets, who celebrated their elevation to the top of the class in the NL East by being clobbered by the Cubs 17-10 yesterday on one of the most Wrigley of Wrigley Field days.
The Mets had no shortage of offense, but the pitching, particularly from starters Octavio Dotel and Jon Lieber, was atrocious, and the long ball carried the day.
With the loss, the Mets fell back into a tie with the Braves, who were playing Philadelphia later last night.
Robin Ventura had four hits and six RBIs, including a pair of two-run home runs, but on a day where Matt Franco was warming up to pitch in the ninth, it wasn’t enough.
Sammy Sosa hit his major-league-leading 39th and 40th home runs and knocked in four runs as the Cubs hit four home runs, including a grand slam by Gary Gaetti off Dotel. Jose Hernandez hit a three-run bomb off Greg McMichael in the Cubs’ four-run sixth as Chicago scored 10 runs via the long ball.
For Sosa it was the third time in his career he has reached the 40-home run plateau and it was his 36th multiple home-run game, including three this year.
A day of incredibly bad pitching started when Dotel gave up seven runs in the first inning and was pulled after two frames having given up an incredible nine runs on only four hits. But he also gave up five walks, a grand slam and Sosa’s 39th homer.
Dotel looked absolutely terrible, mostly because none of his pitches were going anywhere near the plate. Well, one did. That was the full-count pitch to Gaetti that Gaetti nailed over the wall and over the benches in left-center field.
The Cubs sent 10 men to the plate in the first inning and it took 54 pitches for Dotel to get out of the inning, after having given up seven runs and four walks, two of which forced in runs.
He walked Curtis Goodwin leading off, gave up an RBI double to Mickey Morandini and struck out Sosa. Then Mark Grace walked, Henry Rodriguez singled to right to load the bases, and Dotel walked Hernandez and Jeff Reed back to back, forcing in a pair of embarrassing runs.
But the bases were still loaded when Gaetti came to the plate and when he worked the count full, there had to be many in the stands thinking he should just take the pitch and force in another run. Dotel wasn’t just missing, he was missing badly and Jason Isringhausen had to start warming up. He had thrown 44 pitches to that point and walked four, and had it not been for Mike Piazza making several great stops, there would have been a few wild pitches as well.
But Gaetti, probably understanding this game would require many more runs than just the four the Cubs would have gotten from a walk, wasn’t looking for ball four. On the 45th pitch of the inning Gaetti hit his second grand slam of the year and the 11th of his career, making it 7-0 Cubs.
Dotel struck out pitcher Jon Lieber and got Goodwin to ground out to mercifully end the inning, but then he walked Morandini to start the second.
That brought up Sosa, who was one of the few Cubs not to have reached bas in the first. He reached them all in this at-bat, clouting a two-run, opposite-field home run to right, all the way onto Sheffield Avenue on a full count pitch from Dotel.
Dotel got out of the rest of the inning, but then Isringhausen was brought in to start the third. Izzy pitched well for the first two innings as the offense battled back to score six runs and tie the game 9-9. But the right-hander, who was wary of trade rumors circulating about him, gave up a pair of runs in the fifth as the Cubs took an 11-9 lead, and then another in the sixth before Greg McMichael relieved him.
But Isringhausen left with two runners – Sosa and Mark Grace – on board and accountable to his ledger, and McMichael let them score in dramatic fashion. After he struck out Henry Rodriguez on a beautiful changeup, Hernandez took him deep to right center for a three-run home to give Chicago a 15-9 lead.
The Mets added another run in the eighth on John Olerud’s sacrifice fly, a ball that missed being a three-run home run by only a foot.
