NewsMets reprise drama with win over Giants
Wright's four RBIs rally Amazin's from early four-run deficit
By Anthony DiComo / MLB.com
05/16/09 3:13 AM ET
SAN FRANCISCO -- By the time the Mets had capped their latest late-inning dramatics against the Giants, it was past 1 a.m. back in New York City. Quite a few Mets fans were already tucked into bed, unaware of the 8-6 win their team had manufactured at AT&T Park. Quite a few of them had dozed off before David Wright could come through yet again.It figures, doesn't it? Wright struggles in the clutch for six weeks, then thrives in another time zone. Where's the credit? Where's the vindication?
"I think when they wake up and see what he's done," Mets manager Jerry Manuel said, "how he's carried us and how we've come back..."
Manuel didn't finish his thought. He didn't need to. He knows how Wright will be received.
"Like I said before, as cold as he was, there was going to be a time when he would get hot," Manuel said. "And I think that time is now."
Hindsight has proven it. Manuel knew, after all, that Wright had come through on Friday for the second straight night, this time roping a game-tying, three-run double into left field in the seventh. He knew that Wright had knocked in four runs and rapped out three hits in all, including a base hit to help spark the winning rally in the ninth. And he knew that Wright, beloved for most of his first five years in the big leagues, would become Mr. Popular once again.
Even if the third baseman swears that nothing has changed.
"It's baseball," Wright said. "You feel good some days and some days you don't. The preparation is the same. The intensity is the same all year. Sometimes you have success and sometimes you don't. There's no magic formula or special recipe to go out there and get hits."
But a little luck helps. The Mets received their portion in the ninth inning, when Ryan Church sent a sacrifice bunt attempt rolling too quickly down the third-base line. Giants pitcher Brian Wilson fielded it and fired to third base in plenty of time to force out Gary Sheffield, but his throw sailed well wide of the bag.
Sheffield raced around third to score the winning run. And Francisco Rodriguez, pitching for the fourth straight day, suffered no similar lapses. The Giants went in order in the ninth.
On this night, it was about the only thing that seemed to meet expectations. Sporting a lineup without Jose Reyes and Carlos Delgado, the Mets managed to chip away at reigning NL Cy Young Award winner Tim Lincecum throughout the middle innings. Omir Santos and Daniel Murphy drove in runs off Lincecum in the sixth inning, and the Mets knocked him out of the game in the seventh.
Moments later, Wright tied it with his double off reliever Merkin Valdez. Wright now has four hits in his past six at-bats with runners in scoring position, after struggling so mightily in those spots last month that he decided to shave his head.
It seems to have worked, though he'd never admit it.
"It's easy to say because of the results that something's different, but I feel the same up there," Wright said. "I feel confident, just like when things weren't going so good."
It's a steady approach favored by the rest of the team -- including Mets starter Livan Hernandez. Tagged for four runs in the first inning and another in the second, Hernandez found himself staring at a four-run deficit opposite one of the finest pitchers in the league.
Even with Delgado and Reyes in the lineup, and even against a pitcher more mortal than Lincecum, the Mets hadn't erased a four-run deficit all season. So to do it without two of their best hitters and against arguably the toughest starting pitcher they'll face all year?
"Panic?" Hernandez said. "I've got 13 years in the league."
So he didn't panic. Instead, he worked. And the hits and the error that followed made him grateful.
"This team, you never know," Hernandez said. "This team is too good. I feel really happy. I didn't pitch perfect, but we won."
That's 10 wins in 12 games now for the Mets, who have begun perhaps their most daunting road trip of the season with two in a row. On paper, with a depleted lineup, with their fifth starter opposing San Francisco's ace, this seemed to be the type of game the Mets were supposed to lose.
Teams that can score late can reject such destinies, but over the past two seasons, the Mets were not one of those teams.
This year, they seem to be becoming precisely that.
"The spirit of the team was that we still had a shot," Manuel said. "We still had some innings left. Then we got a run here and there, and we got a big hit."
Anthony DiComo is a reporter for MLB.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.
