Loss Has Mets At Boiling Point

The only thing the New York Mets are hitting hard right now is their equipment.

A night after Mike Hampton took on the water cooler, Turk Wendell took out his frustration on his glove, throwing it into the stands in disgust as the Mets lost meekly again, 6-3, to the Philadelphia Phillies on Saturday at New York.

“How many rows deep did it go in?” Wendell asked. “Make the X Games on that one. It was definitely my longest toss.”

Robert Person (8-5) and five relievers combined to give up six hits, sending New York to its 15th loss in 17 September games dating to last year.

New York, which seemed a lock for the playoffs 10 days ago, is 1-7 in September and saw its wild-card lead cut to 3 1/2 games over Arizona. The Mets remained 3 1/2 games behind National League East-leading Atlanta.

Person improved to 3-0 against the Mets in his career, allowing one run and three hits in six innings.

San Diego 7, San Francisco 3--Ryan Klesko’s two-run homer capped the Padres’ four-run third inning as they beat Russ Ortiz and the Giants at San Francisco.

Ortiz, the NL’s pitcher of the month for August, had his career-best seven-game winning streak snapped. Ortiz’s string of 20 consecutive scoreless innings also ended on a second day of shaky pitching for the NL West leaders, whose bullpen blew a six-run lead Friday night.

The Giants lost consecutive home games for the first time since June 10 and 11 against Seattle. San Francisco lost two straight games for only the second time in nearly a month.

Montreal 7, Atlanta 5--Brian Schneider drove in the go-ahead run with a sacrifice fly and Tomas De La Rosa added a run-scoring single in the 12th inning to snap the Braves’ four-game winning streak at Atlanta.

Vladimir Guerrero made the win possible for the Expos, hitting a two-run homer and throwing out the potential winning run in the 10th.

St. Louis 7, Milwaukee 6--Ray Lankford homered leading off the ninth inning, and Mike Matheny homered and singled twice to pace a 15-hit attack in helping the Cardinals edge the Brewers at Milwaukee.

For the second game in a row, Mark McGwire batted second. He popped out to shortstop in his two-pitch at bat and failed to advance J.D. Drew, who led off with a single. Jim Edmonds followed with a double to score Drew.

McGwire, who was in the lineup at second base, did not take the field. Placido Polanco replaced him.

Cincinnati 6, Pittsburgh 4--Dmitri Young hit a tiebreaking, two-run homer in the seventh inning and the Reds ended the Pirates’ eight-game winning streak at Pittsburgh.

Houston 14, Chicago 4--Richard Hidalgo, Lance Berkman and Tim Bogar each hit two homers, part of a team-record seven that powered the Astros to a win at Chicago.