The history of Mets 1-0 loss to Cubs on Wednesday night was the controversial finale involving Pedro Alonso and his home plate slide.
With one out and men on second and third in the ninth inning, Jeff McNeil threw a ball to left field and Alonso scored to try to score the equalizer. Cubs left fielder Ian Happ hit the cut manNick Madrigal at third base, who hit the catcher Miguel Amaya. Amaya blocked the plate and placed the tag on Alonso’s shoulder, prompting the home plate umpire to call out the Mets slugger, ending the game.
Mets manager Carlos Mendoza He asked for a replay immediately after leaving the dugout and what followed was a long wait while the MLB replay center analyzed different angles of the play.
“It wasn’t great, I didn’t love it,” Happ said of the wait with a smile.
The MLB replay center verified whether Amaya illegally blocked the plate and whether Alonso placed his hand on home plate before the tag. Initially, it appeared that Alonso had entered before the tag, but upon further inspection, the first baseman’s hand appeared on the slide.
“There are probably 20 replays out there and I thought most of them he was safe and then you see his hand come up at a different angle,” Madrigal said. “I was sure he was out, but I thought the whole time we weren’t going to make it.”
Ultimately, MLB ruled that Amaya did not violate its rules and that the replay official could not definitively determine whether Alonso’s slide was successful.
“I was 100% sure,” Amaya said of the piece. “And they made the right decision.”
Mendoza was adamant it wasn’t the right decisiongoing so far as to say that the decision cost the Mets the game.
“Their interpretation of the rule,” Mendoza said. “It’s one of those, they send out a memo in spring training, what’s legal and what’s illegal. And it’s clearly in that email, in that memo that we received, that catchers can’t put their foot in front of the base, on top of the base, they can’t walk without possession of the ball. It was very clear that the guy had his left foot on the base without the ball.
“There’s nothing these guys can do, they’re obviously coming from New York. [crew chief] Chad [Fairchild] told me, it’s something you’ll have to talk about with the league. In the end, it cost us a game. I’ll have to wait and see what they say because they clearly got the wrong call.”
The Mets and Cubs face off once again in this four-game series on Thursday afternoon, where New York will seek the division at Citi Field.
