The Cubs have been giving the Mets plenty of stress in their four game series, games the Mets simply had to win to stay on pace in the NL East and Wild Card spots. Game four was a battle Royal to be sure.
The Cubs even threw in a secret weapon to spice things up.. starting Rookie Micah Hoffpauir at 1st Base instead of Lee. All Micah did was go 5 for 5 on the night.. drive in 5 RBIs and hit his first two Major League HRs! His shocking 3 run shot in the 7th gave the Cubs what looked to be a win.. but that was before the magic arrived :)
Will all that, the resilient Mets came roaring back late in the contest to tie it in the 8th.. this after going down by 3 runs and the cold, wet NY fans getting very quiet. But, the Mets kept plugging away.. scoring one in the seventh.. two more in the eighth to tie it (the tying run scored when Ryan Church made an amazing slide to get around the tag of catcher Koyie Hill)... they did this with a nobody-on-2-out rally which was started by superb at bats from Beltran and Church. Ramon Martinez and Robinson Cancel followed with unlikely heroic hits of their own. Cancel's driving in Church for the tying run.
Good ol' Shea Stadium was rocking again in the rain and the stage was set for more heroics in the bottom half of the ninth when Beltran stepped up to the plate. Beltran smoked a 2-0 pitch on a rope down the first base line.. it clipped off the glove of the diving Micah Hoffpauir and trickled into right for the game winner.
Reyes led off the ninth with a single off losing pitcher Kevin Hart, and he stole second after Daniel Murphy, bunting on his own with two strikes, and Wright struck out. After Hart intentionally walked Carlos Delgado, Beltran pulled a line drive off Hoffpauir's glove for his second walk-off of the year.
I've got a pretty good feeling that there will be more Magic in the next few days.
