Brewers 5, Mets 1 in 13 innings: Lucroy bomb breaks it open

W: Duke, 4-0

L: Torres, 2-4

HR: Ramierez (7), Lucroy (5)

Fangraphs WPA Box Score

There were nearly 360 pitches thrown, 4 hours and 10 minutes of gameplay, 3 minutes of rain delay, and 13 innings, but the Brewers somehow beat the Mets in New York tonight to win the series 2-1 when Jonathan Lucroy hit a two-run homer to put the Brewers up 3-1 in the 13th after Brewers relievers escaped from jam after jam.

Aramis Ramirez was the only Brewer batter to get to Jon Niese in 7 and 2/3 innings with a home run to left center field. He struck out Rickie Weeks and Ryan Braun, the 1/2 punch at the top of the lineup, twice each and struck out a season-high 8 batters.  Niese had the Brewers off balance all day and required only 97 pitches before being pulled when Carlos Gomez hit a single to left with 2 outs in the 8th. Juerys Familia came in to get out Aramis Ramirez, who had collected a second hit after his home run at that point in the game.

Kyle Lohse was excellent once again; the only trouble came in the 4th inning in which Carlos Gomez both cost the Brewers a run and then saved the Brewers another one. The record will show that the only run Lohse allowed was unearned, and he finished with 8 innings pitched, 3 strikeouts, 1 walk, and 0 earned runs. Daniel Murphy led off the 4th with a single to center that Gomez badly misplayed and allowed Murphy to advance to 3rd. Bobby Abreu then hit a deep sacrifice fly to drive him in. David Wright then hit a deep fly ball off the wall in left, but Gomez played the bounce well and threw a strike to second base to get Wright out.

Familia came back out and dominated the Brewers with a 1-2-3 inning in the top of the 9th, including a pretty embarrassing strikeout of Mark Reynolds. Will Smith got the first two outs in the bottom of the 9th with relative ease but then walked lefty Lucas Duda. Chris Young then hit a rocket down the third base line, but Ramirez made a fantastic stop to save an extra base hit but could not throw out Young at first base. Ruben Tejada pinch hit in the pitcher's spot with 2 on and 2 out, but grounded out to Ramirez to end the inning.

Collins used a lefty specialist, Josh Edgin, to face Irving Falu to open the tenth and retired him on a flyout to left with one pitch. Apparent Mets closer Jennry Mejia then came on to get Weeks and Braun, who notched his third strikeout of the day. In the bottom half Brandon Kintzler worked a stressful scoreless inning around a single and a walk, getting Eric Campell, a righty who pinch-hit for Bobby Abreu in the ninth, to ground out to third with David Wright on deck.

Mejia injured himself while warming up before the 11th, so Gonzalez Germen came on take his place and promptly struck out Lucroy. Play was interrupted with a quick rain delay, but the umpires sent the players back to the field after a few minutes with significant precipitation still coming down. It appeared that a groundskeeper with a pocket doppler convinced the umpires to not pull the tarp and delay the game at that point. It didn't affect Germen, who came back on to strike out Gomez and got Ramirez to pop out to right.

The bottom of the 11th got wacky. Kintzler walked Wright, who stole second and went to third on Lucas Duda's groundout. He then got behind and walked Chris Young with the 5-man infield in alignment. Then the injured Curtis Granderson had to pinch hit for Germen, and despite his inability to run well (and Kintzler's wildness) they put him on intentionally to load the bases, where he was promptly pinch-run for. Backup shortstop Wilmer Flores grounded to Reynolds, who threw home to get Wright on the force. Next, with the defense back to conventional configuration, Kintzler fell behind Anthony Recker 3-1 but came back to strike him out looking with some help from Angel Hernandez. Recker did not appreciate the call and was thrown out of the game immediately, leaving the Mets with no extra position players.

With 1 out in the top of the 12th, Mark Reynolds and Jean Segura singled back to back against Carlos Torres-- the first time the Brewers had more than a hit in an inning all night. Gennett (pinch-hitting) and Weeks then struck out back to back to end the threat. Zach Duke cruised through the bottom half.

Torres came out again (after throwing almost 2 innings yesterday) for the top of the 13th and Ryan Braun had his first good at-bat of the night with an infield single to short. With nobody out and Braun taking off for second, Lucroy launched a home run out to left. That opened things up a bit, as Carlos Gomez smoked a hit to left, followed by a double down the right-field line from Aramis Ramirez, a walk to Khris Davis, and a single for Mark Reynolds. Dana Eveland did an admirable job trying to mop up the mess, getting a couple of outs before hitting Weeks to drive in a fourth run of the inning. K-Rod, already warm, finished off the 5-1 victory with a perfect bottom half.