Season’s on the brink
Cubs in 3-0 hole after latest defeat against Mets
NEW YORK — Warmer weather, the comforts of Wrigley Field and help from the ivy.
None of that mattered Tuesday night as the Cubs are now one loss from their storied season ending in a humbling manner.
Thanks to the solid pitching of Jacob deGrom, the amazing power of Daniel Murphy and some clumsy Cubs defense, the more polished Mets pulled away to a 5-2 victory and seized a 3-0 advantage in this bestof-seven National League Championship Series.
The Cubs received homers from rookies Kyle Schwarber and Jorge Soler but little else as deGrom harnessed the offense with a 95-mph fastball and effective off-speed pitches.
Meanwhile, the Mets offense constantly applied pressure against Kyle Hendricks and a cast of relievers. Murphy improved his free-agent stock by smacking his sixth home run of the postseason, a solo shot in the third off Hendricks.
Murphy homered in his fifth consecutive postseason game, tying a record set by Carlos Beltran of the Astros in 2004.
But the failure to contain Murphy was just one of several problems the Cubs encountered. Yoenis Cespedes stole third base in the sixth, which proved costly when reliever Trevor Cahill threw a wild pitch on a third strike to Michael Conforto with two outs that enabled Cespedes to score the go-ahead run.
The Cubs caught a break after Soler missed making a diving catch on Wilmer Flores’ line drive and the ball skipped past him.
That initially allowed Conforto to score from first, but the ball was trapped in the ivy. Wrigley Field ground rules state that runners can advance only two bases on such a play.
That resulted in Conforto returning to third, where he was left stranded. But the Cubs weren’t so fortunate in the seventh, when the Mets took advantage of some shoddy fielding to score twice.