Mets Beat Cubs 2-1 in 11 Innings Led By Pete Alonso

Mets 1B Pete Alonso (Photo Credits to David Banks-USA Today Sports)

 The New York Mets beat the Chicago Cubs 2-1 in 11 innings this afternoon at Wrigley Field for their third consecutive win and improved their record to 57-34.

The bats were scoreless for the first three innings against former Met RHP Marcus Stroman, but broke through in the top of the first after SS Francisco Lindor led off with a walk and 1B Pete Alonso followed with a RBI double.

This was Alonso's 75th RBI of the season which broke a tie for the Met club record with 3B David Wright for most RBI prior to the All-Star break.

The offense did not much after that for the next several inning wasting a scoring opportunity in the top of the eighth, but finally broke through in the top of the eleventh.

Lindor led off with a single which moved 2B Luis Guillorme to third after he started out the inning on 2B as the automatic runner since he made the last out in the top of the tenth.

Alonso followed with a sacrifice fly to score Guillorme for his second RBI of the game and 76th overall.

RHP Taijuan Walker started out well with three scoreless innings, but ran into trouble in the bottom of the fourth after he gave up a one-out infield single to RF Seiya Suzuki and then two batters later a RBI single to 1B Frank Schwindel.

Walker settled down after that with scoreless inning in the bottom of the fifth and sixth and was taken out after the inning.

His final line was six innings, four hits, one run, two walks and five strikeouts.

He lowered his ERA to 2.55 and has now completed six innings in his last eight consecutive starts.

RHP Seth Lugo followed in the bottom of the seventh and got into a jam, but was able to escape out of trouble with an inning ending double play.

RHP Drew Smith threw a stellar scoreless bottom of the eighth with two strikeouts.

RHP Adam Ottavino came in next and threw a scoreless bottom of the ninth and stayed in for the bottom of the tenth with the runner on second and no out.

Ottavino came back to strike out the next two hitters he faced and then was helped out by his defense after 3B Eduardo Escobaer and 1B J.D. Davis made an incredible play to save the game for the last out of the inning and send the game to the eleventh.

RHP Edwin Diaz came on in the bottom of the eleventh and continued his dominant season with a 1-2-3 inning for his 20th save of the season.

The Mets next game is tonight at the Cubs in the second game of the doubleheader beginning at 8:05 p.m.