Wednesday, October 28, 2015

World Series Game One

This was a spectacular game -- one of the best World Series games ever played.  Our coverage of the first 13 innings can be found below.  Here's what happened in the 14th:

1.  The Mets, looking more and more like they were up past their bed time, went down 1-2-3 in the top of the inning.  Chris Young, the Royals' pitcher who is scheduled to start Game Four, went 3 innings, allowed no hits, walked one, and struck out four.  He completely dominated the Mets.

2.  In the bottom of the 14th, David Wright made a throwing error on a hard-hit ground ball by Alcides Escobar.  Escobar was safe.  Three pitches later, Ben Zobrist lashed a single to right, and Escobar zipped over to third.

3.  The Royals weren't going to blow a situation where they had men on first and third with no outs, and they did not.  Ancient Mets pitcher Bartolo Colon intentionally walked Lorenzo Cain to load the bases, but Eric Hosmer -- whose error had put the Mets on top a long, long time ago -- lofted a sacrifice fly to right to bring home the game-winning run.

So the Royals win the first game by 5 to 4 in fourteen innings -- the longest Game One ever played in the World Series.

It's obviously too early to know which way this Series will go, but to me, this felt like a bad loss for the Mets.  The Mets have a pretty decent offense, but pitching has been their calling card down the stretch.  In their games with the Dodgers and Cubs, once they got you down, you were basically done for.  But tonight they blew a 3-1 lead, as Matt Harvey gave up two runs in the sixth.  And their closer, Jeurys Familia -- who has been lights out for months -- blew a 4-3 lead in the bottom of the ninth.  After that, the Mets' only other threat ended on a strikeout by hero David Wright in the 11th.  And then Wright's error set up the loss in the 14th.

It's bad to lose any game -- but it's particularly bad when the strengths of your team let you down.  Now the Mets trail for the first time in the post-season, while the never-say-die Royals have pulled out another come-from-behind win.

World Series:
Kansas City leads New York 1-0

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