Amazin' Away Games: The southside of Chicago sees a crazy finish in Zack Wheeler's 2nd MLB start

Amazin' Away Games will look at the craziest, wildest, most memorable games the Mets have played in every one of the 63 venues they have played in.

Everyone remembers Zack Wheeler's major league debut: six innings of shutout ball in a 6-1 win in his hometown of Atlanta where his teammates all doused water on him on the field in celebration.

I didn't get to go to that one, but I did see Zack's second major league start, and it was in US Cellular Field, as it was known then. Mets vs White Sox, June 25th, 2013. I was excited to get to "The Cell" for the first time, but was extremely concerned about the weather, as my flight was briefly aborted in New York after being number one in the queue because of storms in Chicago. If you live in Chicago or have ever been, you know that storm systems off the lake can resemble a mini apocalypse. And the forecast for the next couple of days were absolutely brutal, so I was concerned that one or both of my games would fall victim to the weather, whether it be delays or even postponements.

Amazingly, Zack Wheeler's 2nd major league start would have an on time first pitch, and away we went.

The first thing you have to know is that the 2013 Mets were such a weird mix of core veterans (David Wright, Daniel Murphy), some young players like Wheeler and Kirk Nieuwenhuis, but mostly a hodge-podge of veterans and role players who would be best known as Immaculate Grid All-Stars. As an example, look at some of these names from that night:

If that isn't a roster in transition, I'm not sure what is.

The White Sox had some interesting names on their side too. They ran the gamut from former Mets like Jeff Keppinger, future Mets such as Addison Reed, Alejandro de Aza, to future Met killers like Collin Gillaspie, and even a late career Adam Dunn made an appearance. (And Tom "Jackpot" Hallion was the second base umpire! 2013 was a vibe, man.) They had their share of young players in this game too, including Wheeler's opposite number on the mound. You might have heard of a young man named Chris Sale?

(Yes, that's 1986 World Series hero Tim Teufel scouting Sale.)

Sale had come into the game with a modest 5-6 record, but an ERA was 2.69 which showed that he was deGrom'ed a few times before anyone knew what being deGrom'ed was. Knowing that, and seeing some of the names that you saw in the pictures above, you could tell that the Mets had their work cut out for them.

But the Mets touched up Sale right off the bat in the first. A Marlon Byrd sac fly and an RBI single by Josh Satin gave the Mets a quick 2-0 lead. But Wheeler would give it right back in the bottom of the frame as he gave up a single to de Aza to lead off the game, and he would come around to score on a stolen base and two groundouts to make it 2-1.

Noted Mets killer Tyler Flowers would then touch up Wheeler for a dinger to lead off the 3rd inning to tie the game at 2-2. Andrew Brown then took Sale deep to give the Mets the lead back in the 5th. But the wheels started to come off for Wheeler in the bottom of the 5th. He gave up a single to Gordon Beckham and then hit Flowers with a pitch after Beckham stole second. A wild pitch would then send the runners to second and third, and they would both score on productive outs to give the White Sox a 4-3 lead. Terry Collins would let Wheeler start the 6th to see how he would respond in his second ever start. But Wheeler gave up a long double to Dunn, who went to third on a long sac fly. Then after a walk to Gillaspie, Wheeler was mercifully pulled. Collins brought in Carlos Torres, who got out of that jam to keep the score at 4-3.

Sale would then find his groove as he shut down the Mets in the 6th, 7th, and 8th innings. He threw 110 pitches to Wheeler's 109, but lasted 3 and 1/3 innings longer, giving you a glimpse as to where they were at in their careers. Sale was rocking the Mets and their fans to sleep. I tried my best to rile up the crowd with a very loud "Let's Go Mets! Let's Go Mets!" chant, which evolved into a "I'll do this by myself! I'll do this by myself!" chant which woke everybody up a little bit. (Full disclosure: I was pretty well hammered going into the game as I spent the time between my flight and the game at a place called "Kuma's Too", which unfortunately doesn't exist anymore. But I had a memorable burger and will always remember that as the place where I found out Collin Cowgill was traded to the Angels for a minor leaguer. By the time the 8th inning came, I was just making the transition from tired to obnoxious. Chris Sale will do that to a man.

On to the 9th where future Met Addison Reed came into close it out. David Wright singled to center and then stole second. But Byrd struck out and Josh Satin flew out to center field, bringing pinch hitter Daniel Murphy to the plate to try to tie the game off Reed.

That was the swing that I thought was going to end the game. Murph had popped the ball up in the infield and it looked like that was all she wrote. I only wish that I kept my camera ready to capture what happened next, as the White Sox turned a game ending pop-up into a Three Stooges skit.

Gillaspie was under it. Then Beckham came in like an Animal House skit and blew the entire thing up. Wright came around to score the tying run and all of a sudden, I was getting more baseball than I was expecting.

This play also produced one of the most memorable Hawk Harrelson broadcasting sequences of his entire career:

To be fair, "you gotta be kidding me" was the phrase everyone in that ballpark had in their heads ... White Sox and Mets fans alike.

In the bottom of the 9th, Jeff Keppinger led off the inning with a single, and then on the ensuing sac bunt, LaTroy Hawkins threw one to Rosemont to put runners on first and second. But Hawkins recovered to get the next two outs. Was there going to be free baseball? It would have only been right after that insane top of the 9th to give us even more baseball. Who knows what would have happened then?

Well, no.

Alexei Ramirez's single down the left field line won the game for the White Sox and ended what started out as a normal non-descript game known only for being Zack Wheeler's major league start and ended as a game that brought us hilarity and incredulousness from the players and the broadcasters. It might have been the most insane thing I had ever witnessed on a baseball field that didn't involve a bench clearing brawl.

Epilogue

Zack Wheeler spent 7 years as a Met, with two of those seasons lost to injury. He would finish with a 44-39 record as a Met with a 3.77 ERA and a WAR of 9.1. Just as he was starting to get it, the Mets declined to resign him as a free agent, and he went to the Phillies where he blossomed into one of the league's best pitchers, going 79-40 with a 2.88 ERA and a 35.4 WAR at the time of this writing.

Wheeler wouldn't face Sale again until Wheeler went to Philly. Sale got the win for the Red Sox in 2023 while Wheeler took the loss. Both had no decisions against each other in April of 2025 as both pitchers were roughed up, and Sale got the best of Wheeler again in May of '25 in a 9-3 Braves win. So Sale is 2-0 against Wheeler with Wheeler being 0-2, with both pitchers having two no-decisions. Had it not been for Gordon Beckham, Wheeler would be 0-3 against Sale.

Beckham spent seven seasons with the White Sox before bouncing around the league until 2019. Beckham actually signed a minor league deal with the Mets in 2020 and was added to their player pool when the 2020 season finally got under way after the COVID shutdown. But Beckham never cracked the major league roster with the Mets and never appeared for them in a game.

Gillaspie hit a soul crushing home run against Jeurys Familia in the 2016 Wild Card game as a Giant. If we ever do a series on Soul Crushing Mets Games that I was at, I'll write about that. Until then, I'll leave it alone.

Also, that mini-apocalypse rainstorm came early the next morning. Woke me up at 6:30 AM Central. That thunder was so loud, and the rain was so heavy that I thought I was about to board an ark with two of every animal. The important thing was that the second game on June 26th also started on time and was not affected by weather. And good thing ... because it was Shaun Marcum's one and only victory as a Met.

Ironically, after being first on the runway to fly to Chicago and having to turn back, we were first on the runway to go back to New York ... and turned back due to bad weather in NYC. Never happened before or since, but twice on that same trip.

What are your memories of the Mets at US Cellular Field/Guaranteed Rate Field/Rate Field?