Not only are the Mets the hottest team in baseball, they are the neighborhood tough guy with enough onions and biceps to bloody the bully’s mouth.
With lefty Hisanori Takahashi handcuffing a feeble Yankees lineup and three runs in the final two frames, the Mets posted a 4-0 victory last night in front of 41,220 at Yankee Stadium.
The Mets’ eighth straight victory put them ahead 3-1 in the Subway Series with two games remaining. The Yankees have dropped three straight and the common thread in each defeat is dead wood. Last night the Dead Bat Society flushed a sensational seven-inning, one-run outing by Javier Vazquez, who fell to 6-6 and had a three-game winning streak halted.
After scoring four runs in the previous two games, the Yankees were blanked for the third time this season. In the past three games, the Yankees are hitting .175 (17-for-97).
Angel Pagan’s two-run double in the eighth off Chan Ho Park hiked the Mets’ lead to 3-0, and the way the Yankees didn’t swing the bats, it may as well have been 30-0.
The Mets remained a half-game behind the NL East-leading Braves. The Yankees are tied for the top spot in the AL East with the Rays, who also dropped a third straight game.
Jerry Manuel stayed away from closer Francisco Rodriguez at the start of the ninth with a 4-0 lead, but when Raul Valdes gave up consecutive two-out singles to Francisco Cervelli and Curtis Granderson, Manuel summoned Rodriguez.
A 12-pitch at-bat to Brett Gardner resulted in a walk that loaded the bases for Derek Jeter. But Rodriguez required just three pitches to fan him. That brought Nick Swisher to the plate, and he popped up the first pitch to give Rodriguez his 16th save.
Six scoreless innings and 103 pitches was enough for Takahashi (6-2), who turned a 1-0 lead over to Elmer Dessens after his second outing of six shutout innings against the Yankees this season.
Cervelli greeted Dessens with a double past a diving David Wright at third. After Granderson was announced as the pinch-hitter for Chad Huffman, Manuel opted for lefty Pedro Feliciano and he fanned Granderson for the first out.
Another left-handed hitter, Gardner, followed and Feliciano jumped ahead, 1-2. Three straight balls produced a full count that led to a slow grounder to first for the second out. Cervelli advanced to third and was stranded when Jeter hit the first pitch back to Feliciano.
Park opened the eighth and gave up Pagan’s killer two-run double.
The Yankees didn’t bat with a runner in scoring position until the sixth when Swisher and Mark Teixeira delivered consecutive, one-out singles.
That brought Alex Rodriguez to the plate. Hitless in two trips, A-Rod rolled a weak grounder to the right side for the second out. With runners at second and third, the first three pitches to Robinson Cano were balls. A called strike and three straight fouls made the count full when Cano walked to load the bases for Jorge Posada.
When the game started the Yankees led the majors with a .429 batting average with the bases loaded, grand slams (six) and RBIs (99). Posada hit slams Saturday and Sunday against the Astros.
However, Takahashi got him to bounce into a rally-killing grounder to Wright to preserve the 1-0 Mets lead.