Saturday, April 20, 2019 • 2:15 p.m. ET
Busch Stadium • St. Louis, MO
RHP Chris Flexen (0-0, -.–) vs. RHP Miles Mikolas (1-1, 6.00)
SNY • WCBS 880 AM • ESPN 1050 AM

The Mets survived a Vargas start yesterday and escaped with a win! Now they’ll have to push through a Chris Flexen start to string together a couple of wins. Vargas didn’t last incredibly long yesterday, but was able to hold the Cardinals to only one run. On the other side of the ball, Cano had a good game with three hits and Pete Alonso reached across the strike zone to defend it with 2-strikes and ended up launching the ball deep into center field.

Vargas only lasting four innings is a concern for today with Chris Flexen on the mound who under normal, spot-start circumstances (if there is such a thing) would ask him to go about four or five innings. This will put pressure on Syndergaard tomorrow to save the bullpen but we are getting ahead of ourselves.

Mets Lineup

  1. Brandon Nimmo  CF
  2. Pete Alonso  1B
  3. Robinson Cano  2B
  4. Michael Conforto  RF
  5. Wilson Ramos  C
  6. Jeff McNeil  LF
  7. Amed Rosario  SS
  8. J.D. Davis  3B
  9. Chris Flexen  P

Cardinals Lineup

  1. Matt Carpenter  3B
  2. Paul Goldschmidt  1B
  3. Paul DeJong  SS
  4. Marcell Ozuna  LF
  5. Jose Martinez  RF
  6. Yadier Molina  C
  7. Dexter Fowler  CF
  8. Kolten Wong  2B
  9. Miles Mikolas  P

This is Chris Flexen’s first start of 2019 and the first time we’ll see him in the majors since he lost a good chunk of weight. In Major League Spring Training this year he tossed 2.1 innings over three games and allowed only one hit while striking out two. In Syracuse this year he has allowed seven runs over 12 innings from 11 hits (due to three homers).

As a plus side, his strikeouts are way up, recording 18 in his first two starts. He has never done that. Last year he pitched in 4 games and 6.1 innings allowing 13 runs, nine earned and in 2017 he pitched in 14 games and 48 innings posting a 7.88 ERA. There are only two Cardinals who have seen Flexen before when they were members of other teams. Ozuna is 0-for-1 with two walks and Goldschmidt is 1-for-3 with a strikeout.

The Mets bats will look to make things easier for Flexen by putting up runs against Miles Mikolas. In his first four starts of the season, he has allowed 15 runs, 14 earned over 21 innings leading to a 6.00 ERA, 6.26 FIP, 1.381 WHIP and a 70 ERA+. He is coming off a tremendous year where he went 18-4 over 32 starts and 200.2 innings posting a 2.83 ERA, 3.28 FIP, 1.071 WHIP and a 137 ERA+. The last four stats are amazing considering he led the league in hits allowed at 186 but he only walked 29 batters. He has never faced the Mets but several players on the Mets roster have seen him. The problem is several of them are injured:

Game Notes

Brandon Nimmo has reached base safely in each of his last nine games, batting .393 (11-28) with 10 runs, three doubles, three home runs, seven RBI, six walks with a .514 on-base percentage and a 1.336 OPS. This compares to a .077 (2-26) batting average over his first eight games.

Pete Alonso has reached base safely in each of his last 11 starts. Overall he is batting .333/.425/.739 with 16 runs, seven doubles, seven home runs, 18 RBI and 10 walks. He is tied for fifth in the majors in RBI, sixth in slugging percentage, eighth in doubles and tied for eighth in home runs.

New York’s nine road wins are the second most in the majors. Seattle leads MLB with 10.

Michael Conforto has safely reached base in 12 straight games since April 6. He is batting .318/.464/.795 in that span with 11 extra-base hits, 11 RBI, 11 walks and 12 runs scored. He reached base three times Friday night, marking the fifteenth time this year he has reached base safely at least twice in a game. That places him second in the majors behind only Cody Bellinger, who has 16 such games.

New York has scored 108 runs this season, which is tied for third in the majors and tied for second in the NL. The team has scored five or more runs 14 times this season and owns a 10-4 record when doing so.

The Mets have scored 49 runs in the seventh inning or later this season, which leads the majors. The team’s .304 (72-237) average in the seventh inning or later also leads the majors.

Let’s Go Mets!

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