Pete Alonso Hits 300th Homer as Orioles Beat Mets in 11

Pete Alonso marked his return to Citi Field the hard way Tuesday night, launching his 300th career home run as a visitor in orange and black before the Baltimore Orioles finished a 7–5 win in 11 innings over the New York Mets. The tying solo shot in the ninth and Coby Mayo’s three-run inside-the-park homer in the 11th kept Baltimore three games behind Cleveland for the final American League wild-card spot, per ESPN and CBS Sports.

CBS Sports, carrying Associated Press reporting dated Sept. 15, said Alonso — who hit a club-record 264 homers for the Mets before signing with Baltimore last December — was hitless in his first seven plate appearances of the series before driving a 414-foot solo blast off Kodai Senga with one out in the ninth to knot the score at 3. The Queens crowd answered with a curtain call for the franchise’s all-time home-run leader even as he wore the other uniform.

The milestone made Alonso the 171st member of the 300-homer club, according to CBS Sports’ Dayn Perry. Context mattered as much as the number: Mets fans still cheer the Polar Bear louder than their own clubhouse after New York was eliminated from playoff contention with Monday’s 2–1 loss to Baltimore and then dropped a third straight Tuesday, assuring a losing season at 69–82.

Extra innings stretched the drama. Christian Encarnacion-Strand scored on a wild pitch in the 10th to give the Orioles a brief lead; Marcus Semien answered with a one-out RBI double for the Mets. Alonso struck out against Jonathan Pintaro (2–2) in the 11th before Mayo raced around the bases after a long drive glanced off rookie A.J. Ewing’s glove as he crashed into the center-field fence. Alex Hoppe (1–1) earned the win; Yennier Cano closed it for his 10th save after Bo Bichette’s two-out RBI single, ESPN reported.

Encarnacion-Strand and Jeremiah Jackson had homered earlier for Baltimore, while Carson Benge went deep for New York. Jared Young added a sacrifice fly and Juan Soto an RBI single for the Mets. The middle game of the interleague set left the Orioles at 74–78 — still alive in a crowded AL wild-card chase even as their former first baseman’s milestone dominated the highlight reels.

For Alonso, the night fused nostalgia and necessity. He debuted as a visitor at Citi Field on Monday (0-for-3 with a walk in a 2–1 Baltimore win) and spent much of Tuesday looking ordinary until Senga’s 2–0 ghost fork sat middle-middle. The bat flip, the curtain call, and the subsequent win turned a September interleague date into a career bookmark — and a reminder that Baltimore still needs every late-inning run if Cleveland’s lead holds.

Playoff math remains unforgiving. Three games back of the Guardians with roughly two weeks of regular-season baseball left means the Orioles cannot treat any remaining series as exhibition noise. Mayo’s inside-the-parker — a rarity that required both contact and an outfield misadventure — was the kind of opportunistic break contenders lean on in September, while New York’s collapse into a losing year closes a chapter that once featured Alonso as its power centerpiece.

National desks framed the dual narrative cleanly: ESPN led on the curtain-call milestone against Alonso’s former club; CBS Sports and the AP wire stressed both the 300th and Mayo’s decisive 11th-inning dash. Together they document a night when a visiting slugger’s career number and a young Oriole’s hustle home run kept Baltimore’s postseason pulse alive at the expense of a Mets team already boxed out of October.