Greg
September 17, 2002
McGwire Fever! Poor sports, my pal and I booed him while everyone else cheered. Nothing against Big Mac, we were just concerned that our team, the home team, won and hung in in the very sweaty wild card race. A really drunk, really large guy sitting in front of us, wearing a McGwire batting practice jersey (haven't seen any of them lately, surprising considering it wasn't all that long ago and they must be pretty expensive) cursed us out. "Who do the Mets have?" he demanded. "Rusty Staub?" The great moment of this game was Turk striking out McGwire with runners on. The Wild Card dream would torture us right to the end of this mixed bag season, but at least we won this battle.

Steve Rogers
June 9, 2004
I'm at this game against the Cardinals in 1998 and every time McGwire gets up these kids who are wearing Cardinal McGwire 25 shirts who wouldn't know who holds the record for most HRs in a rookie season (hint, its Mark McGwire) all cheering and going nuts for McGwire and I'm muttering to myself "I'd really would love to flip these kids a double bird and tell them to **** off." Well when Reynoso struck him out I muttered, "I think Reynoso did it for me!"

Steve Sullivan
December 18, 2007
I remember sitting in the last row of the upper deck. This is what baseball is all about, 1-0 game, any swing can win or tie the game. Unfortunately half the fans missed the end because they all left after McGwire's last at bat.

Michael
May 11, 2020
The last game in the stretch were the Mets played an insane 3 doubleheaders in 4 days, due to early season rainouts. I remember well, going into these games, the talk was that this stretch would make or break the team. They ended up going 5-2 in the 7 games and truly solidified themselves as a one of the best teams in the NL.

As for the game, Alfonzo's 1st inning homer held up in the 1-0 win. Armando Reynoso (a pretty underrated pitcher in team history) was fantastic for 7 shutout innings.

Dave VW
February 28, 2024
Greg may be confusing this game for another, because all 3 of McGwire's strikeouts in this game came against Reynoso. Wendell never faced him.

This was a nice bounceback win for the Mets, who got doubled up in Game 1, 10-5. Reynoso got outs when they mattered but I thought he was far from dominant, despite 7 strikeouts. He tied a career high with 6 walks, which included John Mabry twice. That deserves attention because he was batting second ahead of McGwire, so twice Reynoso put a man on base with Big Mac representing the go-ahead run. Luckily for Armando, he owned McGwire throughout his career, striking him out 4 times over 6 ABs while not allowing a hit.

Reynoso also snuck out of a 2nd and 3rd, 1 out jam on the 6th, when Tom Lampkin hit one right back at him, causing the runner at third to get tagged out in a rundown. After a walk to Willie McGee, he then got Placido Polanco (in a spot where I thought the Cardinals should have used Brian Jordan as a pinch hitter) to ground out to end the threat. At 108 pitches, Reynoso's spot in the order came up in the bottom of the 6th with runners on 1st and 3rd and 2 out, and I thought for sure we'd see Matt Franco pinch hit. But Reynoso stayed in, perhaps because Bobby V was conserving his bullpen, and he grounded out.

The Mets also loaded the bases with nobody out in the 8th, only to fail to score again. It was always precarious to give John Franco a 1-run lead to protect in the 9th, by Johnny mowed the Cardinals down 1-2-3 to give the Mets their 3rd of four 1-0 wins of the season.