213 Miles From Shea

In April, the Giants took three games of four from the Mets in Queens. Today, the Mets look to return the favor today as they look to win the four game series against the Giants. So far in the series the Mets have taken down Madison and Cain. Today Chris Young will get the start against Barry Zito.

Chris Young is 2-5 this season over 10 starts and 57.0 innings with a 4.58 ERA. His last start was a rough one as he allowed 6 ER and 7 hits in 4 innings of work. He missed the Giants the first time around this season and the last time he saw them was in 2009 where he allowed only 1 ER in 20.0 innings of work. The Giants have the following numbers against Young:

Theriot 2-7, 2 HR
Scutaro 2-7, 2 2B
Blanco 1-3, 2B
Huff 1-2

Barry Zito is 8-7 on the season posting a 3.87 ERA with 118.0 innings of work. In the month of July he made four starts totaling 24.1 innings of work with an ERA of 4.07. Earlier this season he allowed 2 ER in 5.0 innings against the Mets. The Mets have the following numbers against Zito:

Hairston 7-29, 2B, HR
Wright 4-15, 2B
Bay 3-10, HR
Davis 0-6
Tejada 2-5
Torres 1-3, 3B

Let’s Go Mets!

The Mets offense faded yesterday, but they look to step up again today as the Mets continue their series with the Giants tonight. Matt Harvey was still quality last night but the Mets bats decided to just slip into the night. Jon Niese gets the start today as he takes on Matt Cain.

Jon Niese is 7-5 with a 3.86 ERA on the season over 20 games and 123.2 innings of work. July has been rough for Jon. He pitches well, the he doesn’t, he pitches great, then he really doesn’t. Three starts ago he allowed 1 ER over 7 innings, then 3 ER over 7 innings, then 8 ER over 6 innings.  Against the Giants earlier this season, he allowed 3 ER over 6 innings of work. The Giants have the following numbers against Niese:

Cabrera 4-9, 2B
Posey 3-6, 2 2B
Theriot 1-3
Blanco 1-4
Crawford 0-3
Huff 2-2

Matt Cain is 10-3 with a 2.80 ERA on the season over 20 games and 141.2 innings of work. In his last two starts he has allowed 8 ER over 15 innings of work. He missed the Mets earlier this season and last year he picked up the win as he allowed no runs in 6 innings of work. The Mets have the following numbers against Matt Cain:

Wright 9-21, 5 2B
Hairston 3-15, HR
Bay 4-10, 2B
Murphy 2-7, 2B
Tejada 0-5

Let’s Go Mets!

And just like that, the Mets have won three games of their last five. The Mets offense was able overcome the Giants and the Mets bullpen last night to win the game in extra innings. Tonight, the Mets will hope to win more conventional manner not involving a bullpen meltdown as Matt Harvey makes his second major league start against Tim Lincecum.

Matt Harvey was awesome in his major league debut. As you already know, he pitched 5.1 innings, allowed no runs, and struck out 11, which was a record for a Met his debut. Thus, not only did he win, he set the bar really high for himself tonight and extremely high for Wheeler’s debut (hopefully not sooner than) next season. With only one major league game under his belt, he has not faced the Giants or any current batters on the Giants (unless if there was a trade I’m not aware about).

The Mets draw Tim Lincecum who is 4-11 this season with an ERA of 5.88 over116.1 innings of work. He leads the league in losses and in the month of July over five starts he has an ERA of 6.84. That includes an 8 inning shutout game and a 1 ER over 7 inning game. In other words, his three other starts were really bad. He faced the Mets earlier this season and he picked up the win after allowing 1 ER over 5 innings. It was his first win of the season. The Mets have the following numbers against Tim:

Wright 2-19
Davis 3-12
Bay 2-10
Hairston 1-10
Murphy 5-11, 2 2B
Tejada 2-6
Thole 2-7, 2B

Let’s Go Mets

The last 24 hours have been incredibly busy in baseball with so many buyers with the extra two wild card spots. The one trend that has popped up is that with the increased amount of buyers the amount of full on, fire sale sellers have increased. Here are the trades that have happened (I’ll save my analysis for after the deadline):

Dodgers get Brandon League from the Mariners for Leon Landry and Logan Bawcom

Mariners get Eric Thames from the Blue Jays for Steve Delabar

Pirates get Travis Snider from the Blue Jays for Brad Lincoln

Braves get Reed Johnson, Paul Maholm from Cubs for Jaye Chapman, Arodys Vizcaino

Rangers get Soto from the Cubs for Jacob Brigham

Diamondbacks get Chris Johnson from the Astros for Marc Krauss and Bobby Borchering

Really, really busy last 24 hours.

The Mets have won two of their last four, and look to build on that as they roll into San Francisco. This team has plenty of bulletin board material to use against the Giants including, but not limited too losing 3 of 4 games earlier this season, Wright being ousted from the starting spot by Panda, Cain getting the starting nod in the All-Star game over Dickey and then Giants  performing well in that first inning. It’s time to strike back tonight as Hefner goes up against Bumgarner.

Hefner is 1-4 on the season over 13 games and 4 starts and 38.1 innings of work (5.40 ERA). His first outing this year was against the Giants and he pitched well, allowing no runs over 3.0 innings. In his first start since rejoining the rotation, he allowed 2 ER, 3 total, over 6 innings of work. The Giants have the following limited numbers against Hefner:

Belt 1-2, 2B
Posey 0-2
Cabrera 0-1
Crawford 0-1

Bumgarner is 11-6 on the season with a 3.10 ERA over 20 starts and 136.2 innings.  Since the All-Star break, he has pitched 3 starts, 21.0 innings with a 2.14 ERA. Earlier this season he pitched 7 innings against the Mets allowing one earned run. The Mets have the following numbers against Madison:

Hairston 0-6
Johnson 1-5
Bay 1-2
Cedeno 1-3, 2B
Murphy 0-3
Turner 1-3
Wright 0-3

Let’s Go Mets!

The Mets try to split the series today as they play game 4 in a three game set. After winning the series opener behind Matt Harvey, the Mets dropped game 2 and 3, mostly due to ineffective starting pitching. One highlight from last night to note, obviously, would be Ike’s performance smacking three homers in the game. Anyway R.A. Dickey looks to correct his ship and the team ship as he takes on Joe Saunders and the Diamondbacks.

Dickey on the season is 13-2 with a 2.97 ERA in 139.1 innings of work on the season. As amazing as he was in June, July has been quite the opposite as he has posted a 6.49 ERA over 4 starts and one relief outing. Dickey had a terrific game against Arizona back in May as he allowed 1 ER and 4 H over 8 innings. The Diamondbacks have the following numbers against Dickey:

Overbay 1-14
Bloomquist 4-10, 3B
Kubel 3-7, HR
Upton 2-8, 2B, HR
Parra 3-5, 2B, 3B
Young 0-4

Joe Saunders is 5-6 with a 3.51 ERA on the season over 16 games and an even 100.0 innings of work. He has pitched in three games in July totaling 19.0 innings with a 3.79 ERA. He missed the Mets this year but last year he made one start allowing one earned run in 6 innings of work. The Mets have the following numbers against Joe:

Johnson 2-16, 3B
Bay 5-12, 2B, 2 HR
Hairston 2-8, 2B
Murphy 0-3
Wright 0-2
Davis 0-2

Let’s Go Mets!