Cubs 3 Mets 2 (Citi Field, Flushing, NY)
Mets record: 51-62
Mets streak: Lost 1
WP - Jameson Taillon (7-6)
LP - Drew Smith (4-4)
SV - Adbert Alzolay (15)
Seat on the Korner:
We select the star of the game and virtually invite him to a Seat on the Korner, just as Ralph Kiner used to do for his studio postgame show on WOR-channel 9 broadcasts in the early decades of the Mets.
Mike Tauchman's 8th inning home run was the margin of victory for the Cubs as the Mets one game winning streak comes to an end, 3-2, at Citi Field on Tuesday.
Need to Know
The Mets are 2-8 in their lsat ten games, and were outscored 57-38 in that span.
Pete Alonso's first inning home run was his 34th of the season and made the score 2-0 Mets. The Mets would get four hits since, and only one hit off Jameson Taillon in his 7 innings of work.
Tauchman, Jeimer Candelario, and Yan Gomes would each have two hits on the game, while Cody Bellinger hit a solo home run.
Carlos Carrasco gave up two runs in his five innings of work, giving up three hits and two walks while striking out five. His ERA on the season is now 6.42.
Turning Point
After Tauchman's blast in the 8th, the Mets had runners on first and third with two out and Jeff McNeil up. It was pretty much now or never the way the Mets offense was going.
Julian Merryweather would get McNeil to ground out to end the inning. and the Mets' best threat. It was the only time the Mets would get a runner on third base since the Alonso home run in the first.
Three Keys
Pour me a Jameson: Jameson Taillon has struggled this season, but in his previous five starts, he pitched to an ERA of 2.08 in 30 and 1/3 innings. Tuesday night was a microcosm of his season. Struggled in the first inning, but cruised through the other six.
The Cubs are 6-0 in Taillon's last six starts.
If it's not one thing, it's another. But it could also be the first thing: Drew Smith went from one problem to another. His HR/9 rate last year was 1.8. Not as bad as his ungodly HR/9 of 2.6 in 2020, but bad enough. This season, it's down to 0.9, but he neutralized that with a BB/9 rate of 4.3, up from 2.9 last season. On Tuesday, the old problem crept up and bit him.
An unreal feat: I had a friend message me during the ninth inning. A Cubs fan. He told me that Alzolay was getting his pitches up. He got one up to Daniel Vogelbach as the winning run in the 9th. Somehow, Vogelbach still managed to take a pitch up in the zone and ground into a double play to end the game.
That's how bad a season it's been for Vogelbach. Even on a pitch up, he bails Alzolay out with a ground ball to end the game.
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