213 Miles From Shea

The Mets look to salvage their series with the Indians this afternoon as they try to rebound from their last two games. Today Daisuke Matsuzaka gets his fourth start for the Mets and its pretty safe to say that over the first three starts of his Mets career, it has been a failed experiment. In his first start he allowed 5 earned runs over 5 innings, then he allowed 4 earned over 4.1 innings and finally last time out he allowed 6 ER over 3 innings. The last time he faced the Indians was in 2011 where he allowed 3 ER over 5.0 innings. The Indians have the following numbers against him:

Swisher 4-14, 2B
Kubel 7-13, 2B
Giambi 3-11, 2B
Cabrera 3-9
Shoppach 3-8, 2B

The Mets bats get a shot at Danny Salazar today who is 1-2 over 33.0 innings in his first 6 games of his major league career.(Side note because this section will be light due to Salazar’s rookie status: one of my closest friends has a cat named Salazar that has been thrown at me on several occasions. Like actually thrown. I don’t support the throwing of animals) In that stretch he has allowed 11 ER (3.00 ERA), 24 hits, 9 walks and 37 strikeouts. In his last three starts he has pitched 15.1 innings with a 1.76 ERA. Being his rookie season, it comes with little surprise that Salazar has not faced the Mets in a major league game or any one on the Mets roster.

Lets Go Mets!

The Mets just did not have it last night against the Cleveland Indians, a team trying to make the playoffs battling off the Orioles right now, and the Mets will hopefully find it, whatever it is, before today’s game. Jon Niese will be taking the mound for the Mets tonight. On the season he is 6-6 with a 3.66 ERA over 19 games and 110.2 innings of work. He is 2-0 over 4 games and 27.2 innings with a 1.30 ERA and 27 strikeouts, which is refreshing as the Mets start/continue to look ahead to 2014. He has logged 7.0 innings of work against the Indians in his career while allowing 3 ER. The Indians have the following numbers against Niese:

Bourn 6-16, 2B
Stubbs 2-10
Swisher 2-10
Kubel 1-4, 2B
Santana 1-3

The Mets bats will get a look at Corey Kluber who is 7-5 over 21 games and 122.0 innings of work with 116 strikeouts. Kluber is coming off of a strong start against the Detroit where he shut them down allowing 0 runs over 7.1 innings. His overall games for the season are fairly funny to look at. He either shutouts the opponent, or he allows 3 or 4 runs over a smaller amount of innings. Very few starts deviate from this pattern. He has never faced the Mets in his career and the only Met who has seen him in a major league would be Anthony Recker who is 0-1.

Lets Go Mets!

The Mets travel to Cleveland tonight because, why not?
The Amazin’s stopped their slide last night thanks to a tremendous performance by Dillon Gee who has a 2.01 ERA since the All-Star break and some nice offense from Brown and Duda. Today Zach Wheeler makes the start against Scott Kazmir (yes, that Scott Kazmir). Side story: the Indians are in a playoff race so not only can the Mets play spoiler here, but there is something going on with a chicken in the field as a good luck charm.

Wheeler is 7-3 on the season with a 3.36 ERA over 14 starts and 83.0 innings with 72 strikeouts. In his last five starts, he has pitched 32.1 innings with a 2.51 ERA. Not surprisingly, Wheeler has never faced the Indians in his career and he has never faced anyone on their roster in a major league game. The elephant in the room tonight with Wheeler will be how much more does he pitch this year? For the last several games he’s been saying he’s tired and even though Terry does not wish him to say that, at some point he will probably need to be shut down.

The Mets bats will get a look at Scott Kazmir, someone whose history does not need an introduction to Mets fans. He is 7-7 over 24 games with a 4.36 ERA over 130.0 innings. He’s pitched 19.0 innings in his last four starts with a 7.11 ERA. Not incredibly surprisingly, even though he has been in the league for a while, he has never faced the Mets and has not faced anyone on the Mets current roster.

Lets Go Mets!

For the second time in three days, the Mets play a day game against the Braves. Yesterday the Mets got a good start from Carlos Torres but the offense fell flat only scoring one run and the Mets dropped their third straight game. Today the Mets try to reverse the trend as Dillon Gee plays the role of stopper on the mound against Kameron Loe.

Dillon Gee is 10-9 over 27 games and 166.1 innings with a 3.63 ERA. He bounced back in his last outing after allowing 4 ER over 6 innings by allowing only 2 ER over 7.2 innings. This season he has pitched 20.1 innings over three games with a 3.10 ERA with 13 strikeouts. The Braves have the following numbers against Dillon Gee:

Uggla 4-26, 2B, 3B
McCann 3-18, 2B
Freeman 6-20, 2B, HR
Upton 4-18, 2B, HR
C. Johnson 3-10, 2B

Kameron Loe is 1-2 this season over 13.2 innings and 13 games between the Braves, Cubs and Mariners. His only two games with the Braves was back in July and both were relief outings against the Mets where he allowed 3 ER over 2.2 innings. The Mets have the following numbers against Loe:

Turner 0-2
Lagares 0-1
Murphy 1-2
Brown 1-1, 2B
Davis 0-1
Duda 0-1

Lets Go Mets!

The Mets look to move past their awful performance yesterday as they start game two of this series against the Braves. Yesterday, on very short rest, the Mets were trampled 13-5 by the Braves. Today Carlos Torres tries to make it a different story against Kris Medlen. Carlos Torres is 3-2 on the season over 55.1 innings of work with a 2.77 ERA. His last outing against Philly was a good one as he allowed 1 ER over 4 hits and 6.2 innings. Carlos has pitched 8.1 innings against the Braves allowing only 1 ER, 8 hits and striking out 10. The Braves have the following numbers against Torres:

J Upton 0-5
Freeman 0-5
Johnson, 1-5, 2B
Simmons 2-4, 2B, HR
Uggla 2-4

The Mets bats get yet another look at Kris Medlen who is 11-12 pitching 161.0 innings with an ERA of 3.58. In the month of June he pitched 6 games with 36.0 innings of work and an ERA of 3.00. He’s pitched 18.0 innings in three games against the Mets with a 3.93 ERA. The Mets have the following numbers against Medlen:

Davis 5-21, 2B, HR
Murphy 5-22, 2B
Duda 3-12
Young 1-6

Lets Go Mets!

The Mets find themselves in a very unusual situation today with a day game after a late night game in two different cities. The Mets played the 8:00 nationally broadcasted game in DC and had to fly out for a 1:00 day game in Atlanta. Last night the Mets lost a close one to the Nationals as they were leading the entire game until the bottom of the 8th where the Mets bullpen gave the game away. In the afternoon match, Daisuke Matsuzaka will take the hill against Paul Maholm.

Both of Daisuke’s starts for the Mets have been pretty poor as he has allowed 9 ER over 9.1 innings. The announcing crew has also been joking that his pacing could cause the Mets players to fall asleep on the field. In his first start he did a pretty good job picking up the pace but his last time out was normal very slow. In his career he has made two starts against the Braves allowing 9 ER over 12.0 innings. The Braves have the following numbers against him:

BJ Upton 6-24, 2 HR
Laird 3-8
McCann 1-4, 2B

Paul Maholm is 9-10 over 22 starts and 129.2 innings with a 4.37 ERA. He’s made two starts since coming back and they have been mixed. In his first start he allowed 5 runs, 4 earned over 5.1 innings. In his second start he allowed 1 ER over 6 innings. In his one start against the Mets he allowed 2 ER and 9 hits over 7 innings. The Mets have the following numbers against him:

Murphy 8-15
Turner 1-6
Davis 1-4, 2B
Lagares 0-3
Recker 1-3, HR

Lets Go Mets!

Tonight in front of a national audience the Mets will be going for a series sweep of the Washington Nationals. Last night the Mets were firing on all cylinders dropping in the base hits and getting out of trouble with pitching thus leading to a 11-3 win. Jon Niese will take the mound tonight as he squares up against Ross Ohlendorf.

Jon Niese is 6-6 over 18 games this season pitching 105.0 innings with a 3.69 ERA. He has pitched 22.0 innings in his last three starts with a 0.82 ERA (just 2 earned runs) and 23 strikeouts. The numbers right now are being juked by a complete game shutout he threw in his last outing. Surprisingly, he has not faced the Nationals at all this season and last year allowed 1 ER over 14.1 innings against them. The Nationals have the following numbers against Niese:

Werth 4-17
LaRoche 4-15, 2B, 2 HR
Zimmerman 5-14, 2B
Desmond 2-14, 2 2B
Hairston 1-5

The Mets bats will get another look at Ross Ohlendorf today, the pitcher with the delivery straight out of the early 1900’s. Ohlendorf is 3-0 over 12 games and 4 starts this year with a 2.49 ERA and 43.1 innings of work. Since being back on the major league roster, he has made two starts. In his first he allowed 4 ER over 4.1 innings. In his second, he allowed 1 ER over 5.0 innings. Against the Mets this year he allowed 1 earned run over 2.0 innings and then 1 earned run over 7.0 innings with 8 strikeouts. The Mets have the following numbers against him:

Murphy 4-7
Lagares 2-5, 2B
Satin 2-4, 2 2B
Young 1-3, 3B
Brown 0-3

Lets Go Mets!

The Mets continue their series down south today as they take on the Nationals for game 2. Last night the Mets squeaked by with a 3-2 win thanks to a go-ahead two run homer by Ike Davis. On the other side of the ball, Dillon Gee continue his excellent season with an excellent 7.2 innings of work. Today Zack Wheeler will take the mound for the Amazins as he faces off against Dan Haren.

Wheeler is 6-3 over 13 games and 76.1 innings with a 3.42 ERA. In the month of August he pitched 30.2 innings with a 3.23 ERA. His only start against the Nationals was a night to forget as he allowed 5 ER over 4.2 innings. The Nationals have the following numbers against Zack:

LaRoche 1-2, HR
Rendon 0-3
Span 2-3, 2B
Zimmerman 0-3
Desmond 1-2, 2B

The Mets bats get another crack at Dan Haren who is 8-11 over 25 games and 139.0 innings with a 4.66 ERA. He has been a much different pitcher this past month pitching 34.0 innings with a 2.12 ERA. To put that in perspective, at the start of August his ERA was 5.49. Against the Mets this year he has allowed 6 ER over 11.0 innings and two games. The Mets have the following numbers against him:

Murphy 3-10, 2B, HR
Davis 1-7
Omar 0-5
Lagares 1-5
Duda 1-4, 2B
Young 2-4, 2B

Lets Go Mets!

The Mets head down to the capital to start a series with the Nationals! Yesterday the Mets split their four game set with the Phillies by the score of 11-3. Dillon Gee will take the mound for the Mets today. On the season he is 9-9 over 26 games and 159.2 innings with a 3.62 ERA. He started August off on an amazing run pitching 4 games, 28.1 innings with a 1.27 ERA but he struggled in his last start allowing 4 earned runs over 6 innings. In four games against the Nationals this year he is 3-1 over 25.1 innings with a 2.10 ERA. The Nationals have the following numbers against Dillon:

Werth 8-28, 2B
Desmond 6-26, 3 HR
Zimmerman 4-22, 2B
LaRoche 3-17, 2B
Ramos 2-11, 2B
Span 3-12, 2B, HR

Jordan Zimmermann is 15-7, league leading wins, over 26 games in 170.2 innings with a 3.32 ERA. His last start (7.2 innings, 2 ER) was a good bounce back from his previous start where he allowed 8 ER over 5 innings. He is 0-2 in three starts against the Mets this year with a 3.20 ERA over 19.2 innings. The Mets have the following numbers against Jordan:

Murphy 9-31, 2 2B, 3 HR
Davis 4-21, 2 2B, HR
Duda 2-15, 2B
Omar 3-8, 2B, 3B
Lagares 2-3, 2B

Lets Go Mets!

The Mets and Phillies end their four game set this afternoon as the Phillies look for the series win and the Mets look for the split. Last night Matsuzaka was wild again (except unlike his first start, he was good early and the wheels came off later) and the Mets were not able to recover. Today Carlos Torres gets the start for the Mets as he goes up against rookie Ethan Martin.

Carlos Torres is 2-2 with a 2.96 ERA over 48.2 innings this year with 34 strikeouts. He has 14.0 innings this year as a starter with a 6.43 ERA. In 1.2 innings against the Phillies this year he has allowed 1 ER. The Phillies have the following numbers against Torres:

Rollins 0-2
Ruiz 0-2
Bernadina 0-1
Frandsen 1-1, HR
Mayberry 0-1

Ethan Martin is 2-2 in his first 5 games of his major league career with a 6.33 ERA over 21.1 innings of work. In those innings he’s allowed 25 hits, 15 ER, 13 walks and struck out 23 batters. None of his first five games were against the Mets and he has not faced any Mets while they were with any other teams (which makes sense), so there are no MLB stats against.

Lets Go Mets!