|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||
The Tampa Bay Rays’ Jason Bartlett hit a fifth-inning double to left Saturday to break up Johan Santana’s bid for the first Mets’ no hitter.
Two innings later, he gave up a solo home run to Carlos Pena that turned out to be the winning run, as the Rays beat the Mets 3-1 in pitchers’ duel at Citi Field.
Bartlett’s double advanced our NoNoHitters.com count to 7,548 New York Mets games without a no-no. And in typical Mets style, the opposing team’s first hit led to the opposing team’s first run. Gabe “Welcome Back” Kapler followed with a double to right to score Bartlett and tied the game at 1.
The Mets had struck first in the second inning when Ryan Church doubled to right, advanced to third on a Jeremy Reed groundout and scored on an Omir Santos double.
Santana’s attempt was the 155th potential Mets no-no broken up in the fifth inning. Over their 47-plus year history, the Mets had 64 no-nos killed in the sixth, 22 broken-up in the 7th, 15 crushed in the eight and three (all with Hall of Famer Tom Seaver on the hill) spoiled in the ninth in the 9th.
