Mets(courtesy of mlb.com)
The Mets delivered a wallop in the weekend series opener, and the Phillies responded with a knockout blow to their National League East rivals’ winning streak in the second game.
Now it’s time for a Sunday night battle under the lights at Citizens Bank Park.
The Mets saw their eight-game winning streak come to an end with the Phillies’ 10-0 victory Saturday, and April ace Mike Pelfry took the brunt of the damage, allowing six runs.
On Sunday, the Mets turn to lefty ace Johan Santana, and the Phillies have veteran Jamie Moyer on the mound as both teams try to get in one more salvo before the two NL East leaders — albeit sharing some spotlight with the Nationals — meet again from May 25-27 in New York.
With last year’s 12-6 Phillies advantage an exception, this has been one of the tightest rivalries in baseball in recent years. Since 2005, the series now stands at 48-47, advantage Phillies.
“I love series like this one,” Mets right fielder Jeff Francoeur said, explaining why he wanted to play after being banged up Friday night. “You don’t get a lot of series that have a feel like this one.”
Lineup
Gary Matthews Jr, CF
Luis Castillo, 2B
Jose Reyes, SS
Jason Bay, LF
David Wright, 3B
Fernando Tatis, 1B
Jeff Francouer, RF
Rod Barajas, C
Johan Santana, LHP
Phillies(courtesy of mlb.com)
One day after displaying a rare lack of hustle, Shane Victorino said: “You’ll never see me do it again.” And he went out and delivered a 2-for-5 performance with a double, a homer and three RBIs on Saturday, giving the Phillies some of the offensive spark they’d been missing lately, especially with leadoff man Jimmy Rollins on the disabled list. The day before, Victorino didn’t hustle to first base on a dropped third strike. He’d batted just .200 with three runs in the previous 10 games. “I’ll put it on my shoulders,” Victorino said. “They say the top of the lineup goes, the rest of the team goes.”
Lineup
Shane Victorino, CF
Placido Polanco, 3B
Chase Utley, 2B
Ryan Howard, 1B
Jayson Werth, RF
Raul Ibanez, LF
Juan Castro, SS
Carlos Ruiz, C
Jaime Moyer, RHP
New York
Philly
PLAY BALL
18 comments
saltygary
5/2/2010-8:06pm at 8:06 pm (UTC -4)
LGM!!!!!!
saltygary
5/2/2010-8:22pm at 8:22 pm (UTC -4)
Article from Rob Neyer saying they went back and updated bays uzr and war and how they got it way wrong with fenway
http://espn.go.com/blog/sweetspot/post/_/id/3404/upon-further-review-bays-d-not-so-bad
whataputz
5/2/2010-9:43pm at 9:43 pm (UTC -4)
Went to grab some food and it was 5-2…turned on my tv to see the tenth run go out. De-flated.
gipperpdx
5/2/2010-9:52pm at 9:52 pm (UTC -4)
Johan is NO ace…and Jerry is a blind moron who is about as smart and useful as a bucket of hair.
Booooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!
gategem
5/2/2010-9:52pm at 9:52 pm (UTC -4)
Wow! The Phillies have made an initial statement. They sent Halladay to the mound and he handled the Mets with ease. The Mets sent Santana to the mound and it was like England during the 2nd World War. But the games not over and let’s see if the Mets can bounce back.
gategem
5/2/2010-10:14pm at 10:14 pm (UTC -4)
And we have to keep in mind that against a team with the offensive weapons the Phillies have sometimes they will get Santana and sometimes Santana will get them. Remember the Bull, he does not always lose.
johan4cy
5/2/2010-10:10pm at 10:10 pm (UTC -4)
Not too hard to score runs in Philly. Games not over.
koose
5/2/2010-10:13pm at 10:13 pm (UTC -4)
Back to reality. And 1st place was nice for a couple days.
metsfan4decades
5/2/2010-10:16pm at 10:16 pm (UTC -4)
I’d say ugly but I used that description yesterday.
Anyone have any idea what Johan’s problem was tonight? I’m real curious to see what he has to say on post game.
Without Johan, we’re going nowhere this year.
trs86
5/2/2010-10:20pm at 10:20 pm (UTC -4)
Looked like no feel for secondary pitches and lost concentration then snowballed. I think he will be fine.
koose
5/2/2010-10:24pm at 10:24 pm (UTC -4)
Johan should worry us all,I know he’s a slow starter but getting hammered is cause for worry
trs86
5/2/2010-10:26pm at 10:26 pm (UTC -4)
I would worry more if it occurred again.
koose
5/2/2010-10:36pm at 10:36 pm (UTC -4)
Your right,but the nats hit him real hard and I know that was 3 or 4 starts agobut he was hammered.These big games you want your ace to be good its frustrating but its a long season.what worrys me is maine at cincy another little league ballpark with a fly ball pitcher and the forever frustrating ollie pitching and we are looking at a second straight series loss.
trs86
5/2/2010-10:37pm at 10:37 pm (UTC -4)
True, next series will be a big test for them.
metsfan4decades
5/2/2010-10:41pm at 10:41 pm (UTC -4)
Yeah, so now this is two pitchers we’ll be holding our breath with on their next start: Johan and Pelf. Three if we want to count Maine tomorrow night. Or Ollie in his next start.
Jeeze, never thought I’d be saying thank god for Niese this week.
I could take ’09 because it was an injury ridden season. What is gonna make for a real long summer will be watching uninspired baseball with most relatively healthy. But I’ll be watching nonetheless…..
trs86
5/2/2010-11:01pm at 11:01 pm (UTC -4)
I would say we are a far stretch from that right now.
metsfan4decades
5/2/2010-10:44pm at 10:44 pm (UTC -4)
This: the only high spot for tonight.
According to the New York Post, the Mets are hoping to have Carlos Beltran back by the end of May.
“Beltran is in Florida right now, strengthening that knee and we are waiting for the doctors to give him clearance for him to start doing baseball activities…He’s got a new brace that he is working with and all reports we hear that it is working. We are waiting for the doctors to give us clearance for baseball activities. And once he gets into baseball activities then we will have a better idea when he is able to come back.â€
stickguy
5/2/2010-11:35pm at 11:35 pm (UTC -4)
so they will have a CF wandering around with a leg brace on? Should work.