After losing a couple of games badly over the few days the Mets were able to pounce all over the Marlins yesterday, 14-6. Amed Rosario had a nice two-hit day, J.D. Davis at DH had a three-hit day including a homer, Gavin Cecchini raised his small sample size OPS to 1.056 and Arquimedes bounced back on the mound with a scoreless, clean inning of work. Today the Mets will travel to the Cardinals.

Game starts at 1:05 with no video available, though there is audio from Cardinals on MLB app.

Mets Lineup

  1. Rajai Davis  LF
  2. Michael Conforto  RF
  3. Wilson Ramos  C
  4. Pete Alonso 1B
  5. J.D. Davis  3B
  6. Juan Lagares
  7. Danny Espinosa  DH
  8. Adeiny Hechavarria  SS
  9. Dilson Herrera  2B

Cardinals Lineup

  1. Matt Carpenter  3B
  2. Dexter Fowler  RF
  3. Paul Goldschmidt  1B
  4. Jose Martinez  LF
  5. Tyler O’Neill  DH
  6. Yairo Munoz  SS
  7. Drew Robinson  2B
  8. Francisco Pena  C
  9. Randy Arozarena  CF

Jason Vargas will make his spring debut today. His 2018 campaign was pretty awful and he ended with a 7-9 record over 20 starts and 92.0 innings with a 5.77 ERA, 5.02 FIP, 1.413 WHIP and a 64 ERA+. His career ERA is 4.27, FIP is 4.40, WHIP is 1.318 and ERA+ is 93. 2018 was the lowest ERA+ since 2006 and his first since 2013 that wasn’t over 100. So, he had a bad year. One hope: last year he didn’t have spring training to get himself going as he was injured, hopefully, this year he gets back to being the reliable pitcher he has been in the past.

Things to watch for in no particular order:

  1. Ryder Ryan is available to pitch today. He looked good in his first inning of work this spring. Since being traded to the Mets he has become a different type of pitcher (stat changes here) and could make a lot of us, myself included, eat crow about complaining about the Bruce trade
  2. Drew Smith is also set to make his second appearance in Spring today. Last time out he allowed two hits and a walk in an inning, but got out of it unscathed. He has a live arm that did well in 28 innings and 27 games in the Majors.
  3. Also making his second spring appearance is Luis Avilan who is trying to break into the Mets roster (preview of Avilan here). In his first game, he allowed a hit and that’s it.
  4. J.D. Davis will get another attempt to show off his bat! After his great day yesterday, he’ll have another opportunity to see some more quality pitching early in a spring training game.
  5. All the outfielders competing with a non-roster invite are on the bus today! Rajai Davis is starting, while Gregor Blanco and Rymer Liriano are on the bench.

Let’s Go Mets!

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