Mets begin short road trip with three against the Marlins

The New York Mets (32-46), a team that has only won five games in the month of June, begin a six-game road trip with a three-game set against the Miami Marlins at Marlins Park. This will mark the Mets’ second of three visits to Miami this year with a final series scheduled for September 10-12. The Mets close out their regular season against the Marlins at Citi Field with three games September 28-30, and so far this year, the Mets are 4-2 against Miami.

The Mets are coming off a series loss to the Pittsburgh Pirates, who took two of three from them at home. Coming into the series, the Pirates, like the Mets, were having offensive issues of their own, unable to get timely hitting losing four straight to the Arizona Diamondbacks last weekend in Pittsburgh. But They found their hitting shoes in game one on Monday against the Mets and wound up beating the Mets twice in three games.

The Miami Marlins (32-50) underwent an ownership change in the offseason, and with most of the the heart of the team gone—and most of it’ offense—Miami has a league-worst -115 run differential. They are last in the National League in team batting with a .245/.316/.406 line. As far as pitching goes, they rank next-to-last in the NL with a 4.82 team ERA. The Marlins are coming off a four-game series with the Diamondbacks in which they managed to win only one game, but they are a respectable 12-14 in June, as they’ve been a plucky team that seldom gets blown out

Marlins catcher J.T. Realmuto, considered by many to be the best player on the team, was held out of the final two games against Arizona with a sore wrist. He is hitting .367/.549/.916 this year with Miami. It is not known at this writing whether he will be available for the opening game against the Mets on Friday, but reporters covering the team seem to feel he’ll be good to go. No official word from the team has as yet been issued.

Friday , June 29: Jacob deGrom vs. Sandy Alcantara

deGrom (2018): (5-3) , 101.1 IP, 126 K, 27 BB, 1.69 ERA, 2.14 FIP, 1.007 WHIP

de Grom has certainly been the Mets’ brightest star in an otherwise dark season. Even though he is coming off his worst start since April in his last outing against the Dodgers, it was still a quality start, his eighth in a row. He allowed three runs against LA but still leads the league with a 1.69 ERA. He has two no-decisions against Miami this year.

Alcantara (2018): Triple-A New Orleans Baby Cakes: (5-3), 85 IP, 64 K, 34 BB, 3.71 ERA

Sandy Alcantara is Miami’s is set to make his first major league start. He has pitched in the big leagues before, making eight relief appearances with the St. Louis Cardinals.

Saturday, June 30: Corey Oswalt vs. TBA

Oswalt (2018): Triple-A Las Vegas 51s: (4-4), 47.1 innings pitched, 49 K, 18 BB, 5.32 ERA

Corey Oswalt will be making his first major league start in the middle game of the series for the Mets. He has one relief appearance with New York where he allowed two runs on two hits in 4.2 IP. As of Friday morning, the Marlins have not yet named a starter.

Sunday, July 1: Steven Matz vs. Dan Straily

Matz (2018): (3-5), 78 IP, 70 K, 30 BB, 3.69 ERA, 1.244 WHIP

Matz has had a 1-2 record thus far in June and is coming off a no decision against the Pirates in which he gave up three earned runs. He has been able to go seven innings twice this month and has been a much more consistent starter than earlier in the year.

Strsilly (2018): (3-3), 52.1 IP, 45 K, 25 BB, 4.82 ERA, 1.395 WHIP

Dan Straily is coming off a five game suspension for hitting San Francisco Giants catcher Buster Posey with a pitch on June 19. In that game, Straily only pitched 1.1 innings, allowing four runs on four hits. Two of the hits were home runs off the bats off Posey and Gorkys Hernandez.

Prediction: Mets win their first series in what seems like forever by taking two out of three.