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RECAP
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BOX SCORE
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GAME LOG
NEW YORK (AP) -- Al Leiter hugged Turk Wendell in a loud
clubhouse. Derek Bell played catch with fans in the second deck. Mike Hampton skipped off the field after the final out.
And manager Bobby Valentine wore a disguise in the dugout -- and
even could laugh about it.
The New York Mets looked like winners Sunday.
Leiter restored a sense of calm to Shea Stadium, pitching his
first shutout of the season as the Mets put a stop to their
September swoon with a 3-0 victory over the Philadelphia Phillies.
"We came out and played relaxed ball," Valentine said.
Valentine got in on the act, too, using a few strips of black
tape to concoct a mustache and goatee in the sixth inning. Last
season, he put on a similar face with eye black and sneaked into
the dugout after being ejected, drawing a two-game suspension and
$5,000 fine.
This little prank played out much better.
"I just wanted to have a little fun, that's all," Valentine
said. "Life's too short."
The Mets broke their three-game slide, winning for only the
second time in nine tries this month to move 4½ games ahead of
Arizona in the NL wild-card race.
"Any win is nice. But obviously, with the way we've been
playing, it's nice to end the losing streak and start a winning
streak," Leiter said.
Leiter (15-7) gave up five singles and struck out nine in his
seventh career shutout, and first since blanking Cincinnati 5-0
last Oct. 4 in a playoff for the wild-card spot.
Leiter walked two and threw 135 pitches.
"I didn't treat this like a playoff game, because it wasn't,
but I was determined and focused in on every pitch," he said.
Leiter, who told Valentine before the game that he intended to
pitch nine innings, allowed only one runner to reach second base.
Doug Glanville drew a leadoff walk in the first and moved up when
Scott Rolen singled, but was stranded.
"He threw the ball very Al Leiter-ish," Rolen said. "He was
up in the zone, down in the zone, in and out."
Mike Bordick drove in two runs, albeit with a groundout and a
hit by pitch, and Mike Piazza added a sacrifice fly.
The Mets' offensive woes continued as they got only six hits,
but that was enough to beat Omar Daal (3-18).
Daal, who leads the majors in losses, dropped his sixth
straight start.
New York is batting just .199 in 14 games since battering
Arizona ace Randy Johnson on Aug. 25.
"We didn't get a whole lot of hits, but we did things to win
the game," said Jay Payton, who singled twice. "I think we all
came to the park upbeat today. We're still in a good position."
In a series that already had seen Hampton knock over two water
coolers and Wendell toss his glove into the stands, there was
subtle sign of early Mets frustration. Piazza threw down his bat
at the plate after stranding two runners with a comebacker that
ended the third.
By the top of the eighth, however, Bell was delighting the
sellout crowd of 53,775 by throwing the ball into the second deck
while warming up.
The Phillies, with the worst record in the majors, were trying
to complete their first three-game sweep at Shea since Sept. 11-13,
1979. On the day they finished that sweep, Pete Rose and Mike
Schmidt scored and Steve Carlton was the winning pitcher as manager
Joe Torre's Mets lost 2-1.
New York's win made Philadelphia and the Chicago Cubs the first
two teams in the majors to be eliminated from postseason
contention.
Phillies second baseman Kevin Jordan did Daal no favors in the
fourth inning.
In the top half, Jordan pulled a hard foul that hit Daal in the
right ribs while he sat in the Phillies' third-base dugout. In the
bottom half, Jordan let a hard grounder bounce off his chest,
setting up the Mets' first run.
Todd Zeile doubled with one out -- right fielder Brian Hunter
broke in, then fell as the ball sailed over his head -- and advanced
as Payton was credited with a single on his hard hopper to Jordan.
Bordick then recorded his 500th career RBI, getting thrown out on
an infield chop that scored Zeile.
In all, it was the kind of inning that had been going against
the Mets lately.
"You need breaks to win a game. Any team does," Valentine
said.
Bordick was hit by a pitch with the bases loaded in the sixth,
making it 2-0. With one out, Daal suddenly lost his control,
issuing his first three walks of the game and hitting Bordick in
the foot.
Daal moved closer to becoming the first pitcher in the majors to
lose 20 games since Oakland's Brian Kingman in 1980. Phillies
manager Terry Francona said Daal, 1-8 since being acquired from
Arizona, would remain in the rotation.
"I can't give up," Daal said. "I don't worry about that."
Piazza picked up his third RBI in 14 games with a sacrifice fly
in the seventh that scored Bell, who led off with a double.
Game notes
Mets 3B Robin Ventura, in an 0-for-22 skid, sat out. ...
The Phillies had a four-game sweep at Shea in June 1995.
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Baseball Scoreboard
Philadelphia Clubhouse
NY Mets Clubhouse
RECAPS
NY Yankees 6
Boston 2
Chi. White Sox 0
Cleveland 0
Toronto 6
Detroit 2
Kansas City 13
Texas 8
Oakland 11
Tampa Bay 0
Seattle 8
Minnesota 1
Anaheim 2
Baltimore 1
Montreal 4
Atlanta 0
NY Mets 3
Philadelphia 0
Cincinnati 6
Pittsburgh 4
Milwaukee 4
St. Louis 3
Houston 7
Chicago Cubs 6
Los Angeles 12
Colorado 1
Florida 4
Arizona 3
San Francisco 10
San Diego 2
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