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NEW YORK -- Stuck in a batting slump all week, the New York Mets seemed unlikely to even get a hit. Scoring? That looked downright impossible. Yet somehow, they rallied. The Mets suddenly struck for three runs in the ninth inning against Philadelphias makeshift bullpen minus closer Jonathan Papelbon, then ended a five-game skid by beating the Phillies 5-4 Sunday on Ruben Tejadas single in the 11th. "Desperate? You can call it desperate if you want to, but we have to stay positive," Mets manager Terry Collins said. "I dont know, standing on the edge of the cliff probably is a better way to describe it." Down 4-1 with only three outs left, the punchless Mets fought back, sparked by Daniel Murphys two-run homer. Phillies manager Ryne Sandberg said Papelbon was sore and unavailable to pitch in a third straight game. "The daily grind of the season," Papelbon said. "Its just kind of a product of the last couple of games." Lefty reliever Antonio Bastardo and Roberto Hernandez -- who started Friday night -- quickly let the Phillies lead slip away. In the 11th, Chris Young opened with an infield single, barely beating the flip from second baseman Chase Utleys glove. The Mets sent up pitcher Zack Wheeler as a pinch-hitter, and he put down a perfect sacrifice bunt that moved Young to second. Juan Lagares drew an intentional walk and Anthony Recker loaded with the bases with another infield hit stopped by diving third baseman Reid Brignac. Tejada won it with one out, hitting a sharp single to left-centre against Jeff Manship (1-1). Tejadas teammates chased him down in short right field to celebrate. "It feels pretty good after a rough week for me and the team," said Tejada, who recently lost his starting job at shortstop. Scott Rice (1-1) got Brignac on a grounder with two runners on to finish the 11th. Held to a total of nine runs in their previous five games, the Mets began their comeback in the ninth when Eric Young Jr. led off with a double and Murphy followed with a home run that made it 4-3. Chris Young ended his 0-for-18 slump by hitting a one-out double off the wall, and Hernandez emerged from the bullpen -- he threw 99 pitches in the series opener. Pinch-hitter Bobby Abreu singled off the glove of a diving Utley, and a slow grounder by Lagares drove in the tying run. When Tejada came up in the 11th, he said he had one thought in mind: "Finish the game." The Mets comeback denied Cole Hamels his elusive first win of the year and the 100th of his career. He struck out 10 in seven innings while throwing a whopping 133 pitches, the most by any major leaguer since San Franciscos Tim Lincecum tossed 148 in his no-hitter last July 13. The Mets started quickly when Young Jr. led off with a single and stole second, Murphy walked and David Wright hit an RBI single. NOTES: A day after making his debut, the Mets Eric Campbell singled for his first big league hit. ... Jonathon Niese struck out twice, leaving Mets pitchers 0 for 63 at the plate this year. ... The four-game Subway Series begins Monday night at Yankee Stadium with Mets RHP Bartolo Colon (2-5, 5.36 ERA) facing RHP Hiroki Kuroda (2-3, 4.43). The teams play twice in the Bronx before shifting across town for two more at Citi Field. The Mets went 4-0 against the Yankees last year. ... Lefty-hitting Curtis Granderson didnt start vs. Hamels, but Collins said the outfielder would be in the lineup Monday night. It will be Grandersons first game in the Bronx since leaving the Yankees in the off-season, signing with the Mets and saying: "A lot of the people Ive met in New York have always said that true New Yorkers are Mets fans." ... Several players swung pink bats on Mothers Day to support the fight against breast cancer. In keeping with the days theme, Mets reliever Carlos Torres asked the team to play the hip-hop song "Dear Mama" by the late Tupac Shakur over the PA system if he got into the game Sunday. Torres didnt pitch. ... It was Bark at the Park Day to support pet rescue and adoption. Many fans brought their dogs for a pregame parade around the warning track. Not barking was longtime Mets hot dog vendor Willie B, popular for his loud woofing in the second deck. He said his back was hurting, so he was carrying a lighter tray of pretzels. Real dogs are allowed to sit with their owners in the right-field porch at these Bark events -- on those days, Willie B says he instead refers to his usual wares as "frankfurters, out of respect." Custom Atlanta Hawks Jerseys . -- Shanshan Feng was alone in her opinion about the pin positions in the Kraft Nabisco Championship. Josh Smith Jersey . Canadas 5-1 loss to Finland in the semifinal ranks as the tournaments most-watched game with a record 2.7 million viewers, the largest ever for a World Juniors game played outside of North America, and winning Saturday as the most-watched program on Canadian television. http://www.authenticbasketballshophawks....-jersey/.Murray has played 20 matches in five weeks, winning three titles to climb to fifth in the ATP Race.The two-time Grand Slam champion also seeks to qualify for next months ATP World Tour Finals.Murray said: I always wanted to qualify for it, but also I want to get back into the top 8 players in the world and it makes a huge difference for seedings in the major events. Mike Bibby Jersey . Adam Lind provided the power and rookie starter Marcus Stroman had the best start of his young career as the Blue Jays dumped the Yankees 8-3 at Rogers Centre. Stroman, making his fifth start for Toronto, allowed one earned run and three hits over a career-high eight innings. Taurean Prince Jersey . The Calgary Stampeders running back received the West Division nomination for the CFLs top individual award Thursday in voting by the Football Reporters of Canada and leagues eight head coaches.The Washington Capitals overhauled their defence, by paying huge money to a pair of former Pittsburgh Penguins. Numbers Game breaks down the signings of Matt Niskanen and Brooks Orpik. The Capitals Get: D Matt Niskanen and D Brooks Orpik. Niskanen, 27, picked a terrific time to have the best year of his career, scoring a career-best 10 goals and 46 points while playing a career-high 21:18 per game. He was also a career-best plus-33, which is all well and good, but he was one of six regular defencemen (minimum 62 games played) to have a combined on-ice save percentage and on-ice shooting percentage (PDO) at 5-on-5 of 103.0 or better. An on-ice shooting percentage over 10.0% is difficult for any defenceman to sustain, but Niskanens 10.32% was the third-best of his career; basically, its the kind of good fortune that shouldnt be expected, but its not out of the realm of possibility from season to season for Niskanen. Where the puck luck really stuck with Niskanen last year, was that he also had a .928 on-ice save percentage during 5-on-5 play, so getting favourable percentages at both ends of the ice during the same year contributed to that strong plus-minus. That shouldnt diminish the evaluation of Niskanen entirely, though, because he has consistently been on the right side of the puck possession ledger, and that makes him an asset to any team that acquires him. While Niskanen hasnt typically played hard minutes, and in some years has been excessively sheltered, hes likely to face more difficult matchups now that hes the highest-priced defenceman on the Capitals roster. Signed for seven years and $40.25-million, Niskanen landed the biggest free agent contract of the year. There was probably an element of paying for the good fortune that Niskanen experienced last year, and it is a gamble that Niskanen is going to be able to live up to the money involved in that contract, but if a team is going to swing for the fences on a free agent defenceman, doing so on a guy with consistently strong possession numbers is at least a reasonable foundation on which to make that investment. Which brings us to Brooks Orpik, a 33-year-old who has made his bones as a physical, hard-hitting defenceman, registering more than 200 hits in five of the past seven seasons. The unfortunate part, however, is that Orpik in position to hit so much -- particularly in recent years -- because his team doesnt have the puck as often when hes on the ice and the problem with a defensive defenceman who is already on the wrong end of the possession game is that hes certainly not likely to get better as he gets older. For example, in the 2013-2014 season, there were seven defencemen that were over 35 and scored fewer than 20 points (as Orpik has in everyy season of his career, except one).dddddddddddd Its an okay list, some useful players, but six of the seven were 35 or 36. Orpik is signed through his age 38 season and the only -- the only -- NHL defenceman that played more than 60 games without scoring more than 20 points last season was Tampa Bays Sami Salo, who has never played the kind of physical, banging style that characterizes Orpiks game, in part because Salo was always hurt anyway. This doesnt offer much encouragement that the Capitals wont have massive regrets about the Orpik signing; the only question is how soon will those regrets occur? Can he give the Capitals a couple of solid years, maybe facing lower-calibre of competition than he did in Pittsburgh? Thats probably the best hope, but its a longshot that the last two, maybe even three years, wont have the Capitals paying big money for a spare part on their blueline. Orpik is signed for five years, at a cap hit of $5.5-million per season. Big money, long term. Pittsburgh anticipated that they would lose both Niskanen and Orpik and, in addition to having an opening or two for some prospects, they also signed Christian Ehrhoff to add stability to their defence. Its entirely understandable for the Capitals to make a move to upgrade their defence. They allowed 33.5 shots per game, ranking 27th in the league, last season, so the defence needed to get better. Ultimately, the Capitals are better today after adding Niskanen and Orpik, but that should never be up for debate when committing close to $11-million annually to two players. What has to matter is how much better they are, whether the money spent is worth it and what the fall-out will be. The Capitals dont have to make any moves --- they are under the $69-million salary cap -- but they have $28,762,500 committed to their defence, according to Cap Geek. The only teams spending in that neighbourhood for their defence are Philadelphia and Tampa Bay, who have Chris Pronger and Mattias Ohlund, respectively, on long-term injured reserve. St. Louis and Chicago are spending in the $24-million-to-$25-million on their respective bluelines right now, so its hard to imagine that the Capitals maintain the status quo, leaving a hole at second line centre while sticking with the most expensive defence corps in the league. We will see what other moves the Capitals have in mind this summer but, right now, it appears that they spent a lot of money to get better in the short-term; signing deals that appear to have more downside risk because of the long terms involved. Scott Cullen can be reached at Scott.Cullen@bellmedia.ca and followed on Twitter at http://twitter.com/tsnscottcullen. For more, check out TSN Fantasy on Facebook. 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