During last night’s 5-2 Game 3 win against the Cubs, the bat of Yoenis Cespedes came alive. “La Potencia” went 3-for-5 at the plate with a double, two RBI’s, one run scored and a stolen base. Cespedes who thus far has had a subpar- to his standards – postseason, is getting red-hot at the right time.
“I think every player goes through some rough patches and obviously I’ve had some rough patches in the previous games, but I’m trying to make up for that now,” said Cespedes who before last night was 1-for-8 in the NLCS.
Cespedes got the scoring started early for the Mets with a double that knocked in David Wright to put them up 1-0 in the first. Later on in the seventh he punched a single to left that scored the captain for the second time on the night. Cespedes was locked in at the plate and it couldn’t be coming at a better time. He looked disciplined and was not getting cheated like previous games we have seen recently.
In a night filled with some pretty bizarre sequences, Cespedes was right in the middle of one of them. In the sixth inning, he singled to lead off the frame and then was bunted over to second by Lucas Duda. Cespedes then showed off his flashy speed and swiped third base.
With reliever Trevor Cahill on the mound for the Cubs, left fielder Michael Conforto then struck out, but the ball bounced past the catcher to the backstop for a wild pitch allowing Cespedes to score what would be the winning run of the ball game, putting the Mets up 3-2.
“I was preparing myself for the ball to hit the dirt. It happened one other time before, but I wasn’t able to go ahead yet. So in my mind I was trying to be prepared for anything that could happen,” Yo explained regarding the play.
“Well, Cespedes came in knowing that we had to be a little aggressive on the bases, something we don’t normally do,” Terry Collins told reporters after the game.
“We’re not that kind of a team. But we told the guys, look, if you get on and you think you can go, go. And Yoenis got a great job, and it just shows you there is not a phase of this game that he can’t do. And that was a big play for us.”
Cespedes added that he and the Mets know there’s still work to do and that they won’t take anything for granted at this moment.
“I think the team right now is really high on confidence, however that does not mean we’re going to go out there tomorrow assuming that it’s good to go for us, but we will go out with confidence that we’re going to win this thing.”
Game 4 of the series is tonight, with first pitch scheduled for 8:07 PM EST as the Mets look to punch their ticket into the World Series for the first time since 2000.
