With Noah Syndergaard set to return to the starting rotation on Sunday, Seth Lugo was destined to return back to the bullpen sooner rather than later.
That happened on Tuesday night and he provided a tired Mets bullpen with as much as they could have hoped for.
Lugo, 28, relieved Jason Vargas in the sixth inning and delivered three scoreless innings for the team, while striking out two and allowing only one hit.
The right-hander’s performance was actually only an inning shorter than his start on Thursday night, in which he pitched four innings (60 pitches) and allowed zero runs, three hits, and no walks while striking out three.
While it could be argued that he should have stayed in the rotation after that performance, Lugo has proven to become, arguably, too vital of an arm out the of the bullpen at this stage and the Mets saw it crumble while he was unavailable in that capacity.
On the year, Lugo sports a 1-1 record, 2.04 ERA, 0.93 WHIP, and 39 strikeouts in 39 2/3 innings pitched.
With Zack Wheeler and Jason Vargas pitching better over their last two starts each, the Mets had an easy decision to place Lugo back in the bullpen once Syndergaard was officially assigned to start Sunday’s Subway Series matchup with the New York Yankees.
Now that both Lugo and Anthony Swarzak have returned to the Mets bullpen, the team is hoping to receive much better results from their relief corps.
