Not long after the clock struck midnight on Sunday, the 2015 New York Mets’ Cinderella season was shattered.
The Mets lost the fifth game of the World Series to the Kansas City Royals, 7-2, in an extra-inning affair. Kansas City won the series 4-1, parlaying a combination of late-inning offensive heroics, clutch hits, good luck and poor Mets defense into the franchise’s second world championship.
Adding to the heartbreak for Mets fans was that the Royals clinched their championship at Citi Field; the crowd had been raucous for eight innings before the latest Royals rally sucked the noise and life out of the stadium. It’s the third straight Mets postseason to end with a loss in Flushing; they previously lost the 2000 World Series to the Yankees, then the 2006 National League Championship Series to the St. Louis Cardinals, at Shea Stadium.
For a while, it looked as if the Mets — who suffered a grueling late-inning loss in Game 4 Saturday night — might push the series back to Kansas City on the strength of Matt Harvey, who pitched eight scoreless innings and took a 2-0 lead into the ninth. But Harvey gave up a leadoff walk to Royals outfielder Lorenzo Cain and then a double to first baseman Eric Hosmer that scored Cain.
Harvey gave way to closer Jeurys Familia, who lost the lead two batters later when Hosmer scored on a ground ball that Mets first baseman Lucas Duda fielded and threw wide of home plate to catcher Travis d’Arnaud.
The Mets couldn’t bounce back in the bottom of the ninth and the Royals put the game and series away in the 12th inning, scoring five runs in the top of the frame.
For Mets fans, it will take a while for the sting of this bitter loss to wear off. Even so, they can take some solace in what was otherwise a tremendously successful season.
Buoyed by its young starting pitchers, the Mets won 90 games and their first Eastern Division title since 2006. They then defeated the Los Angeles Dodgers in a dramatic, five-game Division Series, then swept the Chicago Cubs in four games to capture their fifth National League championship. Their playoff run captured the attention of Queens and the entire city, as fans came out in droves to Citi Field, local bars and restaurants and a pep rally at Queens Borough Hall to cheer on the borough’s home team.
Many questions now surface for the Mets heading into 2016, as several players key to their championship run — namely outfielder Yoenis Cespedes and second baseman and NLCS most valuable player Daniel Murphy — will become free agents.
