Series Preview: Mets Host Cardinals For Three Games At Citi Field

 

The New York Mets (72-72, third place in the National League’s eastern division) continue their second-to-last home stand of the season, hosting manager Mike Shildt’s St. Louis Cardinals (73-69, third place in the National League’s central division) for three night games at Citi Field. For the Mets, coming off an emotional series victory over the New York Yankees, complete with a 9/11 memorial, comebacks, blown leads, and a benches-clearing incident, the story remains the same. They need to win basically every day, get help from other teams, and see what happens. The hope is that the series against the Yankees propels them to do exactly that.

The optimistic view is that the Mets need to shave two games off the Braves’ five-game lead before October 1, when the Mets will travel to Atlanta for a season-closing three-game series. Of course, if the Mets go into that series needing to sweep to tie and force a playoff game, they would be in a dire situation. However, most Mets fans would sign for that possibility right now, given that the guys from Flushing find themselves five games behind Atlanta with 18 games to play.

After this series, the Mets will take Thursday off, before hosting the second place Phillies in a three-game series over the weekend. The Mets will then travel to Boston for two games, then visit Milwaukee for three before returning home to play the Marlins three games, prior to heading to Atlanta.

The Braves will be hosting the Rockies (Tuesday through Thursday) as the Mets take on the Cardinals. After that series, Atlanta travels to San Francisco, Arizona, and San Diego before returning home to close the regular season against the Phillies and Mets.

There it is. The work is difficult, and it needs to be done immediately. The Mets have some momentum,  but are running out of time to wait on “the process.” If they can get hot, they can trim the deficit to three (or perhaps fewer) games and give themselves a chance going into the last weekend. The Braves will face reasonable competition (with the exception of Arizona) the rest of the way. None of that will matter if the Mets don’t start winning immediately and often. The Mets also remain in the hunt for the second wildcard in the National League. They are currently three games behind in that race, trailing the Reds, Cardinals, and Phillies.

The weather may pose a few challenges with showers possible Tuesday and Wednesday nights in New York. However, it would appear that the games will be played as scheduled.

Let’s take a look at the pitching matchups for the series with the Cardinals.

Monday, September 13: RHP Adam Wainwright (15-7) STL vs. LHP Rich Hill (6-6) NYM 7:10 pm

Wainwright is no stranger to the Mets, and at age 40 (he turned 40 on August 30) is having one of his best seasons. The tall right-hander from Georgia has a 2.98 ERA and a 1.03 WHIP this season. His career record is 182-105. He has a career ERA of 3.35 and a career WHIP of 1.21. In 2021, Wainwright has struck out 163 batters in 184.1 innings pitched. He does not appear to be slowing down as he pitches in his 16th major league campaign.

Hill will be making his tenth start for the Mets since be acquired from Tampa Bay in July. He has yet to win a game in the orange and blue, and has lost twice. Overall, Hill has pitched well since joining the Mets. At this point of his career, the 41 year-old from Boston can realistically be expected to provide five or six innings of effective baseball, and he has generally done that. His last two starts have been very good. On September 3, he faced the Nationals in Washington, tossing six innings of shutout ball on three hits. He followed that up on September 8 against Miami with another six innings, this time letting up one run on five hits. Hill will need to be on his game against Wainwright.

The game can be seen locally on WPIX and heard locally on WCBS radio 880 am.

Tuesday, September 14: RHP Jake Woodford (2-3) STL vs. RHP Marcus Stroman (9-13) NYM 7:10 pm

Woodford is 25 years old and from St. Petersburg, Florida. He appeared in 12 games for the Cardinals last season, his first in the major leagues, and has been in 22 games in 2021. He is pitching to a 4.28 ERA and a 1.39 WHIP this season. Woodford has struck out 40 batters in 48.1 innings pitched in 2021. Over his brief career, he has logged 69.1 innings, striking out 56 hitters. His career ERA is 4.67 and his career WHIP is 1.33.

Stroman has been solid all year, posting a 2.87 ERA and a 1.13 WHIP. At times he has gotten the “deGrom treatment”, in that the Mets have not scored runs in his starts. An example of this would be his last start on September 9 in Miami. In that game, the native of Long Island threw 6.1 innings of one-run ball on four hits, only to see the Mets score just two of their own runs in the game and ultimately lose.

The circumstances were different in his start in Washington on September 4 (first game of a doubleheader), but the result was the same. The Mets scored nine runs for Stroman, who pitched five innings in a seven-inning game, allowing three runs. The Mets coughed up the lead before winning in extra innings, but Stroman was unable to get credit for the win.

The game can be seen locally on WPIX and heard locally on WCBS radio 880 am.

Wednesday, September 15: LHP Jon Lester (5-6) STL vs. RHP Tylor Megill (3-4) NYM 7:10 pm

Lester was acquired by St. Louis at close to this year’s trading deadline from the Washington Nationals. He has a combined ERA of 4.75 this year, to go with a 1.54 WHIP. The native of Tacoma, Washington is in his 16th season, and has a career record of 198-117. His career ERA is 3.65 and his career WHIP is 1.28. Lester is now 37 years old, and has been very good in his last three starts. On August 30 against the Reds, he allowed just one earned run in 6.1 innings. On September 5, he went 5.1 innings against the Brewers, letting up just one run. He faced the Reds again on September 10, and this time he threw seven innings, with the Reds scoring two earned runs against him.

Megill is coming off the best start of his career on September 10 against the Yankees. In that game, the native of Long Beach, CA went seven innings, allowing the Bronx Bombers just two earned runs in a game the Mets won by a 10-3 score. In his rookie season of 2021, Megill has an ERA of 4.06 and a 1.20 WHIP.  He has struck out 88 batters over 77.2 innings pitched. Megill’s best month was July, when he posted a 1-0 record and a 1.04 ERA in five starts. In August (six starts) and September (two starts) his ERA marks are 6.44 and 4.15 respectively. The Mets will need another start like Megill’s effort against the Yankees this Wednesday night.

The game can be seen locally on SNY and heard locally on WCBS radio 880 am.

Miscellaneous Series Notes

The Cardinals and Mets both have a .239 team batting average (tied for 19th in MLB)

The Cardinals have hit 161 home runs (23rd), the Mets have hit 160 home runs (25th)

Cardinals’ team OPS is .707 (22nd), Mets’ team OPS is .709 (21st)

Cardinals’ OPS leaders are Tyler O’Neill (.866), Paul Goldschmidt (.832), Nolan Arenado (.811)

Mets’ OPS leaders among active players are Pete Alonso (.855), Javier Baez (.819), Jonathan Villar (.783), Francisco Lindor (.729)

The Cardinals haver a staff ERA of 4.13 (14th), the Mets’ staff ERA is 3.75 (4th)

Brandon Nimmo is on the injured list for New York, as is catcher Tomas Nido

Pitcher Jack Flaherty is on the injured list for the Cardinals, as is outfielder Justin Williams (seven-day)

The Mets’ season is on the line (it seems as though we say this all the time). They have a positive push from an emotional weekend at Citi Field. As noted above, at minimum they need to trim two games off the Braves’ lead in two and one-half weeks to give themselves a chance for the division. If they can win their games (six of which are against the Cardinals and Phillies), they have a realistic shot at a wildcard. It can be done. However, the Mets have almost no margin for error, and need to go out and take care of their own business, while hoping for help elsewhere.

It all needs to start Monday night at Citi Field, and continue for the seventeen games after that.