Marcus Stroman has been very mediocre since donning the orange and blue uniform. He has now given up 14 earned runs in 24.2 innings pitched with the Mets. Stroman has walked 12 in those 24.2 innings so he has done himself no favors in the process.

Stroman began the game with a 1-2-3 first inning including a strikeout of Jason Heyward. His fastball velocity more or less ranged from 90-93 in that inning.

In the second, he was helped out by an overly aggressive Javier Baez. He was trying to turn a double into a triple but the Mets got him from doing that. He followed that up with a strikeout of Kyle Schwarber and it became a scoreless inning.

Stroman pitched a scoreless third inning and worked around a walk to his counterpart, Yu Darvish. In the fourth, he got around a two-out jam. He walked Baez and Schwarber singled to put runners on first and third. Stroman maneuvered around it with a strikeout of Ian Happ.

The fifth and sixth were when the Stroman struggled the most with a two-run homer to Addison Russell highlighting the damage. The pitch came on an inside cutter but apparently, Russell was ready for it.

Meanwhile, in the sixth, he gave up a double to Kris Bryant and a two-run homer to Baez. He did get a few more strikeouts but at that point, the damage was done. His final line was: 6 IP, 6 H, 4 ER, 2 BB, 7 K.

“I need to be better,” Stroman said. “I thought I threw the ball pretty well. I just made bad pitches in big moments to Baez and Russell and they capitalized. Pretty frustrating.”

Since joining the Mets, the 28-year-old has seen his home run rates go up. He’s given up the long ball three times with the team since being acquired which for someone who relies on the ground ball, is not good.

Stroman’s exit velocity for the season is 87.4 MPH but the Cubs had one that was 91.7 MPH last night. Essentially, they managed to square him up better.

The right-hander has a solid release point difference between all his pitches which means that it is more likely that the Cubs had very good scouting on him. Stroman is not an overpowering pitcher so every little thing he does matters so much more than a high-velocity starter like Noah Syndergaard.

Going forward, the Mets will need Stroman to be the guy they traded their two top pitching prospects for. Hopefully, he figures out whatever has been ailing him thus far because the Mets need all hands on deck if they want to capture the second NL Wild Card spot.