Solo homers by Chad Curtis and Cecil Fielder had given the David Cone and the Yanks an early 2-0 lead. The Mets had no hits until John Olerud's seventh inning leadoff double.

Coney wound up with a no decision after pitching eight innings and allowing two runs and two hits. He walked two and struck out eleven.

Cone, in his first career start against the Mets, was as dominant as ever. He struck out 4 of the first 5 batters he faced, struck out the side in the 5th, and, like Bob said, didn't allow a hit until Olerud's leadoff double in the 6th. Olerud would score after he moved to third on a wild pitch and came home on an RBI groundout by Carlos Baerga. In the 8th, Matt Franco led off with another double and was pinch-run for with Steve Bieser. Bieser would move to third on Luis Lopez's groundout to second, and, dancing off third base in what would be his defining moment as a Met, distracted Cone just enough to cause him to balk him home and tie the game. Joe Torre argued but it was for naught, and Cone's reaction immediately after balking revealed he knew he was guilty.

Rick Reed was solid and Juan Acevedo, making his first appearance as a Met, held the Yankees scoreless through 2.1 innings. In the 10th, the Mets staged a 2-out rally after a walk, a single, and a Chad Curtis error put runners on 2nd and 3rd. But Lopez couldn't get the big hit, grounding out to end the threat. In the bottom half of the inning, Greg McMichael issued a walk and a single to put runners on the corners with 1 out. Bobby V brought in John Franco to face Tino but Martinez singled to left to plate O'Neill and claim victory for the Yankees. It was Tino's first hit in 13 at-bats during the series.

Curtis and Fielder's homers just barely left the yard: Curtis' over Bernard Gilkey's glove to left and Fielder's barely over the wall in right that actually was missed by a fan and fell back onto the field. For Curtis, it was his first HR as a Yankee. Joe Girardi also thought he had homered in the 5th inning, but after circling the bases and a vehement protest by the Mets outfielders and Bobby V, the umps got together and ruled the ball landed foul just beyond the RF pole. Replays were inconclusive on whether they made the right call, and I have to wonder -- if the Mets had won the game -- if this overturn would have been a bigger deal in retrospect. Rick Cerone, who was calling the game along with Bobby Murcer on WPIX, spent the next 15 minutes whining and moaning about how the umpires shouldn't be allowed to overturn home runs and how it took all the momentum away from the Yankees and the replays clearly showed the umps got it wrong. I liked Cerone in his one season with the Mets in 1991 and enjoyed his commentary when he was on NBC, but he was a big-time Yankees homer by 1997 and it drove me nuts listening to him bellyache when the Yankees were the beneficiary of perhaps the most-botched HR call in baseball history just the previous postseason when Jeffrey Maier reached over the wall to catch Jeter's flyball. What a crybaby!