The Mets have an opportunity tonight to do something that has been very elusive for the Mets this year: win a road series. The Mets enter the rubber game against one of the premier teams in the league as they try to knock out the Padres tonight. The question of course for the Mets tonight is if Santana can continue being Santana and if the Mets can actually back him up with some runs as they take on Clayton Richard (aka one of those players with two first names, if you like to keep track of those sort of things).
Santana (4-2, 3.03) has pitched 29.2 innings in his last 4 starts with a 0.91 ERA. In each of those four tstarts he has gone through at least 7 innings of work, and of course there is the controversy of whether he should have pitched the ninth inning in his last start, that ended as a 2-0 Mets loss in the bottom of the ninth. Last season he got the win in game against the Padres as he allowed one earned run over 8 innings of work. The Padres have these numbers against Santana:
Gonzalez 2-9
Eckstein 0-7
Gwynn 0-4
The Mets bats get to contend with Richard (4-3, 3.00 ERA) who has pitched 21 innings in his last 3 starts with a 2.57 ERA. Actually if you look back to his last 4 games, he he has allowed 2 ER, 1 ER, 1 ER and 3 ER all over 7 innings of work. Last season he picked up a win against the Mets pitching against them once as he allowed 3 ER over 5.2 innings of work. The Mets have put these numbers on Richard over his career:
Francoeur 1-3
Pagan 1-3
Tatis 2-3, 2B
Lets Go Mets!
