The Mets look to sweep the Pirates this afternoon to closeout the homestand!
The Mets are rolling right now, winning three straight games, four consecutive series and nine of their last 12 games. Tuesday night was their second come-from-behind victory in a row. This time the Mets were down 1-0 and were able to capitalize on a Pirates team struggling with fundamentals by scoring a key run on a balk. The Mets bullpen continued their dominance shutting the door once the Mets had the lead.
Luis Severino is on the bump to finish off the Pirates today. Over his first three starts of the season Severino has pitched 15 innings with a 3.00 ERA, 3.91 FIP, 1.400 WHIP and a 139 ERA+. He’s coming off of arguably his best start of the season where he held the Royals to one run from one hit over five innings. He was limited to only five innings due a season high four walks allowed. His next step, like many of the starters in the Mets rotation is to get through six or more innings (he’s pitched exactly five innings in each start this season). The Pirates have the following career numbers against Luis Severino:
- Oneil Cruz 1-3, BB
- Ke’Bryan Hayes 1-4 2 K
- Bryan Reynolds 2-5, 2B, K
- Jack Suwinski 0-5, 2 K
- Michael A. Taylor 2-2, HR
- Rowdy Tellez 0-4, 2 K
The Mets bats will look to give Severino some breathing room tonight by scoring runs against Bailey Falter. Over three starts this season (15 innings), Falter has a 4.20 ERA, 4.98 FIP, 0.933 WHIP and a 102 ERA+. Early season stats are easy to skew and that is happening to Falter here. In his first start of the season he allowed six runs from five hits and three walks over four innings in Miami. Since then he has allowed one run from five hits and a walk over 11 innings against the Orioles and Phillies. Falter faced the Mets once last year and allowed one run from four hits (including a solo homer) over 5 1/3 innings. The Mets have the following career numbers against Falter:
- Pete Alonso 1-6, HR, BB, K
- Francisco Alvarez 1-2
- Brett Baty 0-2
- Francisco Lindor 2-5, 3 BB, K
- Starling Marte 1-5, K
- Jeff McNeil 1-6, K
- Brandon Nimmo 2-7, HR, BB, 3 K
- Tyrone Taylor 1-4, K
- Joey Wendle 0-4
Three Things To Watch For:
- The Mets pitchers have been limiting hits. The Mets have allowed 128 hits this season, that’s tied with the Guardians for second best in the league (Tigers lead the league at 116). The last two days the Mets have allowed a total of eight hits. While this is an unsustainably low rate, this is at the heart of the Mets comeback over the last 12 games. The Mets lead the National league in ERA at 3.33 and sixth overall in the league (Royals lead the league at 2.86).
- Doubles, again! Before Tuesday’s game we talked about how a major change for the Mets was hitting doubles, the Mets had four of them in Monday night’s game. Three of the four hits Tuesday night were doubles. Hitting doubles has put the Mets in a position over the last several days for more interesting things to happen. Double steal? Did that Monday night. Score on a balk? Did that Tuesday night. When the Mets get runners into scoring position, good things happen.
- The back of the Bullpen is rested. The Mets needed to give Raley, Ottavino and Díaz the night off on Tuesday after all pitched on back-to-back days. Reed Garrett came in as a savior again, pitching two spectacular innings. López and Smith slammed the door closed behind Garrett. Now the big arms rested and ready to go to complete the sweep today.
Let’s Go Mets!
