Mets Try To Make Pirates Walk The Plank And Take Series

Starting Lineup

1. Mike Baxter – LF
2. Kirk Nieuwenhuis – CF
3. David Wright – 3B
4. Lucas Duda – RF
5. Daniel Murphy – 2B
6. Ike Davis – 1B
7. Ronny Cedeno – SS
8. Rob Johnson – C
9. Jonathon Niese – LHP

The Mets and Pirates play the rubber game this afternoon at 12:35 in Pittsburgh, as the Mets look to get back to back wins. Yesterday was the first bad day at the plate for David Wright, but he was picked up by a big hit by Lucas Duda and the Mets pitching staff. Dickey had a great day, 7 IP, 11 K’s, and Francisco had a 1-2-3 inning save (crazzzyyy). Anyway in today’s game Jon Niese will take on Charlie Morton.

Niese is 2-2 this season with a 4.85 ERA over 8 games and 42.2 innings of work. Jon’s last outing in Toronto was his worst of the season as he allowed 8 ER over 3.0 innings of work. The outing was so bad that it raised his ERA from 3.40 to 4.85. Jon hasn’t faced the Pirates since 2010 where he picked up the win in 5.0 innings of work allowing only 1 ER. The Pirates have the following numbers against Niese:

Barmes 2-9, 2B, HR
McGehee 1-5, 2B
Barajas 2-3, HR
McCutchen 2-3, 2 2B
Walker 1-3

Charlie Morton gets the nod for the Bucs today. On the season he is 2-4 with a 4.35 ERA over 7 starts and 39.1 innings of work. In the month of May Charlie is 1-3 with an ERA of 5.64. Last season he made two starts against the Mets going 0-1 over 10.0 innings with a 6.30 ERA. The Mets have the following numbers against Charlie:

Murphy 2-7
Torres 1-6
Turner 2-5
Duda 2-4, 2B
Wright 0-4

Let’s Go Mets! Check 213 Miles From Shea!