The Mets look to extend their winning streak to six games tonight! The Mets are coming off of a convincing 8-1 win Friday night. Before the game the Mets jumped into the trade deadline acquiring Gregory Soto from the Orioles for Wellington Aracena and Cameron Foster. Soto is a hard throwing lefty that generates a lot of whiffs (87th percentile) but also walks a lot of batters (10th percentile). Lefty relieving has been a weak spot for the Mets this season but with Brooks Raley returning last week and now Soto, the Mets look a lot better than they did a couple of weeks ago.
Tonight’s matchup pits two 2025 All-Star lefties against each other. There is pressure on the Giants who have lost seven of their last ten games and have a bullpen game on deck for tomorrow.
David Peterson has a chance tonight to set a new career record for innings pitched in a season. Last season he tossed 121 innings over 21 games. He is sitting at 115 innings over 19 starts this season with a 2.90 ERA, 3.34 FIP, 1.217 WHIP and a 132 ERA+. This season has been comparable to last season where he ended the season with a 2.90 ERA and a 133 ERA+.
Peterson is coming off of a strong start against the Reds where he held them to one unearned run over six innings. In July he has allowed four runs, two earned over 19 2/3 innings (0.92 ERA, 3.24 FIP). The Giants have the following career stats against Peterson:
- Willy Adames 2-9, 2B, 7 BB, 2 K
- Patrick Bailey 1-2, K
- Rafael Devers 4-10, 2B, 2 K
- Wilmer Flores 1-5, HR, BB, K
- Luis Matos 1-1, BB
- Heliot Ramos 1-2, 2B, K
- Casey Schmitt 0-2
- Dominic Smith 2-5, 2 K
- Mike Yastrzemski 0-3, K
Robbie Ray has pitched 123 1/3 innings over 21 starts this season with a 2.92 ERA, 3.76 FIP, 1.127 WHIP and a 132 ERA+. He started July off strong with a 2.18 ERA, 4.25 FIP over 20 2/3 innings spread over three games including a complete game. His last start was rough though allowing five runs over 4 1/3 innings of work. The Mets have the following career numbers against Robbie Ray:
- Pete Alonso 1-6, 3 K
- Francisco Lindor 1-3, HR, 2 K
- Starling Marte 8-23, 2B, 3B, HR, 2 BB, 9 K
- Jeff McNeil 0-6, K
- Brandon Nimmo 2-6, 3B, HR, 2 K
- Juan Soto 1-6
- Luis Torrens 2-11, 2B, 4 K
Three Things To Watch For:
- Francisco Lindor is back. Lindor went 2-for-4 on Wednesday with a run scored and two RBI’s. It was a massively positive sign for the Mets leader who was mired in an 0-for-30 streak. The weight has been lifted from Lindor’s shoulders and he came out swinging Friday night. He went 3-for-5 with a double, a home run, a stolen base and scored three runs. Hopefully this is the start of a hot streak!
- Get Robbie Ray out of the game. The Mets were able to get Logan Webb out of the game early Friday night forcing the Giants to use four of their relievers to close out the game. Camilo Doval, one of their high leverage relievers, needed to toss 29 pitches. As of right now, the Giants are looking at a bullpen game on Sunday night. The Giants are also spiraling a bit right now, and tonight is their best chance of winning a game this series. There’s a lot of pressure on the Giants tonight. Look for the Mets to work counts, drive up pitch counts, steal bases. The Mets should be as annoying as possible and make the bullpen work tonight so tomorrow is even tougher.
- Basepath battle. The Mets stole three bases Friday night bringing them to 84 on the season, which is good for 10th in the majors. For context, the Giants have only stolen 46 bases this season, which is tied for 28th in MLB. Robbie Ray has struggled with allowing runners to advance on the base paths this year. From Statcast, if there is only a runner on first, Ray has allowed 10 stolen bases and has only caught one batter. Hitters have attempted to steal a base on Ray though only 1.7% of the time this season (last season it was a very high 6.2% of the time). He ranks towards the bottom of the league with a -4 net bases prevented. David Peterson actually leads the league by himself with +7 net bases prevented. Runners on first are attempting to steal on Peterson only 0.3% off the time. Only one runner has been successful at stealing on Peterson when they are at first and the only runner on the base paths.
Let’s Go Mets!
