The Game 2 matchups for the ALCS and NLCS this past weekend favored both the Chicago Cubs and Toronto Blue Jays, but neither club could take advantage. The New York Mets and Kansas City Royals delivered for their home crowds and surprised the MLB once again.
New York notched another win over Chicago last night after a 4-1 triumph at Citi Field. The Mets got after Cubs' right-hander Jake Arrieta in the first inning and scored three runs off of a David Wright RBI double and a Daniel Murphy two-run homer.
Yoenis Cespedes then reached on an infield single in the third, which scored Curtis Granderson, and that was pretty much it for the night. Noah Syndergaard tossed 5 2/3 innings and gave up just one run on three hits and a walk and struck out nine.
New York's bullpen also shut down Chicago and threw 3 1/3 scoreless innings in relief. Jon Niese, Addison Reed and Tyler Clippard kept it together before Jeurys Familia came on in the ninth for his second save of the postseason.
Arrieta surrendered four earned runs on four hits and two walks in five innings and the Cubs managed to scatter only five hits on the night. They're now down 0-2 in the NLCS as the series heads to Chicago.
As for the Blue Jays, they're also down 0-2 in the ALCS after a heartbreaking loss on Saturday. Toronto led Game 2 of the series 3-0 heading into the seventh inning and starter David Price had retired 18 straight batters up until that point.
But it all soon unraveled when the Royals started off the inning with three straight singles. Eric Hosmer brought home the first run of the game for Kansas City with an RBI single that scored Ben Zobrist. Kendrys Morales added an RBI groundout in the next at-bat that scored Lorenzo Cain, and then Mike Moustakas tied the game with an RBI single of his own, which scored Hosmer.
Price went from pitching six dominant innings of scoreless baseball to allowing five earned runs on five hits in just 2/3 of an inning after Alex Gordon hit an RBI double and Alex Rios capped off the rally with an RBI single off reliever Aaron Sanchez.
As expected, the Blue Jays didn't have an answer for the Royals' bullpen. Kelvin Herrera and Wade Davis got out of jams in the eighth and ninth innings to seal the 6-3 victory (Moustakas hit another RBI single in the eighth).
The win overshadowed another mediocre start from Royals' starter Yordano Ventura. The right-hander allowed three earned runs on eight hits and two walks in just 5 1/3 innings before Kansas City went on a tear.
The Blue Jays will need to rebound on Toronto on Monday night if they hope to make this series at all competitive. Kansas City will send Johnny Cueto to the mound to face Marcus Stroman in a must-win game for the Blue Jays.
