Wright Leads Mets to a 7-6 Victory

David Wright had been struggling, locked in an eight-for-43 slide that had chopped 20 points off his batting average. Then he went hitless in his first three at-bats Sunday.

But in a big eighth-inning spot against the Florida Marlins, Wright showed why he will be the National League’s starting third baseman in Tuesday night’s All-Star game.

With New York scuffling and in danger of losing three of four games to Florida, Wright hit a three-run homer that was the difference in the Mets’ 7-6 victory at New York.

“The last couple of weeks, I haven’t felt that great up at the plate,” Wright said. “I was just trying to clear my head, just relax up there.”

Wright has 20 homers and 74 runs batted in at the All-Star break and the Mets (53-38) lead the NL East by 12 games.

St. Louis 7, Houston 5 -- Aaron Miles doubled in two runs in the 12th inning to give the Cardinals the win at Houston.

St. Louis dropped the first game of the series before taking the last three to head into the All-Star break nine games above .500.

Astros Manager Phil Garner had used his entire bench by the 11th inning and was forced to use to pitching ace Roy Oswalt as a pinch-hitter with two out in the 11th.

Oswalt hit a grounder down the left field line for what looked to be a double. But the Cardinals pulled off a successful appeal, and umpire Bob Davidson ruled that Oswalt missed first base on his way to second.

Arizona 8, Colorado 5 -- Orlando Hudson and Luis Gonzalez homered, and the Diamondbacks scored five runs in the seventh inning and completed a three-game sweep at Denver.

San Diego 10, Washington 9 -- Mike Piazza hit a ninth-inning pinch-hit home run to give the Padres a victory at Washington. The West-leading Padres overcame a 7-1 deficit with four runs in the sixth, one in the eighth and four in the ninth to run their winning streak to five games.

Chicago 11, Milwaukee 4 -- Glendon Rusch filled in for Mark Prior with five solid innings at Milwaukee and the Cubs won their third in a row.

Prior was scratched before the game because of a strained muscle in his left side.

Philadelphia 8, Pittsburgh 3 -- Cole Hamels pitched five innings to win for the first time in over a month. The Phillies won their first home series since May 29-31 against Washington.

Atlanta 8, Cincinnati 3 -- Andruw Jones hit a two-run homer and the Braves roughed up All-Star pitcher Bronson Arroyo at Atlanta.