On Tuesday night, the owners of the National League’s top two brands open a three-game series at Citi Field in Queens. The Los Angeles Dodgers are visiting the New York Mets in what could very well be an NLCS preview.
Here’s the top of the MLB standings as of Tuesday morning:
- Los Angeles Dodgers: 89-38
- Houston Astros: 82-47 (8GB)
- New York Mets: 82-47 (8GB)
- Atlanta Braves: 79-50 (11GB)
- New York Yankees: 78-51 (12GB)
“It matters,” Mets co-ace Max Scherzer told MLB.com of the Dodgers’ series. “They’ve had a great season so far in what they’ve been able to do. You play this game to go up against the best. Obviously, they’ve been one of the best teams in all of baseball. For them to come into town, you want to beat them. It’s a great opportunity.” for us, a big challenge for us to go out there and face them.”
Here are the details of this week’s three-game series in New York. Selected games can be streamed on fuboTV (try it for free).
|
tuesday august 30 |
7:10 p.m. Eastern Time |
LHP Andrew Heaney (2-1, 1.94) vs. RHP Taijuan Walker (10-3, 3.38) |
SNY, SportsNet LA, TBS |
|
Wednesday, August 31 |
7:10 p.m. Eastern Time |
RHP Tyler Anderson (13-2, 2.69) vs. RHP Jacob deGrom (3-1, 2.15) |
SNY, SportsNet LA, MLB Network |
|
Thursday September 1 |
4:10 p.m. Eastern Time |
RHP Dustin May (1-1, 1.64) vs. RHP Chris Bassitt (11-7, 3.34) |
SNY, SportsNet LA |
With Scherzer out of the series (he pitched Sunday) and both Walker Buehler (Tommy John surgery) and Clayton Kershaw (back) injured, pitching matchups lack star power, but it’s hard to complain when a 3.38 ERA is the way to go. the worst among the six scheduled pitchers. These two teams are stacked. It is no coincidence that they are at the top of the National League standings.
“It’s going to be a good series for the fans,” Mets manager Buck Showalter told MLB.com. “You don’t crave it, necessarily. What you crave is the competition of going up against a really good team.”
Here are three things to know about the Dodgers vs. This week’s Mets at Citi Field, with a prediction thrown in for good measure.
1. Season series even
The Dodgers and Mets split four games in Los Angeles in June and the run differential was one plus 1 in favor of New York. It was an even series. Here are the scores:
Mets first baseman Pete Alonso has crushed the Dodgers throughout his career, particularly at Dodger Stadium, going deep three times in that four-game series. Buehler allowed five runs in 2 1/3 innings in that June 4 game. It turned out to be his penultimate start of the season before he needed elbow surgery.
The Dodgers have a significant lead for the best record in the MLB, so the chances of a tiebreaker coming into play are small, but it’s worth noting that the winner of this week’s series will win the series of the season and , therefore, will secure home court advantage if the two clubs finish. with identical records and are in the postseason. Again, unlikely, but I’d rather have the tiebreaker than not.
2. Timmy Trumpet will be available
Mets closer Edwin Diaz is enjoying a dominant season: He’s struck out exactly half the batters he’s faced, and every time he walks into a game at Citi Field, his entrance song “Narco “Electrifies the crowd. It’s quite the scene:
Timmy Trumpet, the Australian musician who teamed up with Dutch duo Blasterjaxx to create “Narco,” will be available for Tuesday’s game. He promised to perform the song live if Diaz comes into the game..
“Nothing makes me happier,” Trumpet told MLB.com of Diaz’s use of his song to bring the Citi Field crowd to life. “That’s exactly what this song was intended to do.”
Diaz last pitched on Friday, so he will likely be well rested before Tuesday’s game. There’s even a chance he’ll pitch in a no-save situation just to get some work done and stay in shape. And, if it happens, the crowd will be treated to a live version of “Narcos.”
3. Who’s hot, who’s not
Baseball season is long and full of peaks and valleys. As such, some players enter this week’s series at a peak, while others are stuck in a valley. Here are three Mets players who have been at their best over the past two weeks:
Canha has three home runs in his last nine games, all of them hooked late in the inning, after hitting three homers in his previous 66 games. He recently told The Athletic that he made a mechanical adjustment to the plate not too long ago, specifically widening his stance, and that helped him rediscover his power punch.
On the other hand, Alonso (.218/.271/.345) and fellow All-Star Francisco Lindor (.228/.290/.316) enter the Dodgers’ series after falling the past two weeks. Now here are three Dodgers players at the top of their game:
Stalwart Justin Turner has turned things around after his slow start and has hit .333/.407/.458 over the past two weeks. Even then, the Dodgers have a somewhat heavy lineup. Betts, Turner and Freeman (the 1-2-3 hitters) entered Monday’s game with a combined .307/.368/.520 average. The rest of the Dodgers are hitting .242/.323/.420, which is above average but not out of this world.
Cody Bellinger (.205/.289/.333) and Chris Taylor (.216/.302/.378) are the two notable Dodgers hitters who haven’t had much success the past two weeks.
4. Prediction
This is truly a heavyweight matchup. It could be the best and most compelling series we see in the entire regular season. For our prediction, I go with the Dodgers win two of three. Los Angeles is head and shoulders above the rest of the league, including the Mets, and I’d be tempted to predict a sweep were it not for deGrom starting Wednesday. It should be an exciting series. I just like Los Angeles a little bit more right now.
