Good Morning,
We made it! The playoffs are finally here. Maybe not how everyone envisioned it would be during the course of the season. But who cares about that now.
The Mets are 13 wins away from a world championship. The journey begins tonight at 8:07 pm with Max Scherzer on the mound against Yu Darvish. It should be an amazing atmosphere at Citi Field on what is expected to be a cool night. There’s nothing better than October baseball. The Mets will welcome it in black jerseys.
We have a jam-packed issue to get you ready for it all, so let’s jump right in.
👍 READY TO GO: Max Scherzer has been here before. That’s why he was loose and confident in taking fielding drills at Citi Field Thursday afternoon and talking to reporters about his plans to watch Batman with his kids on his final night before his biggest start yet as a Met.
In terms of his health, he says, “I’m not limited by this oblique at all.”
Games like tonight is why Steve Cohen shelled out $130 million.
🍎 ROTATION ORDER: We’ve speculated all week, and we still don’t know who will take the ball in Game 2. However, we did learn something yesterday: the Mets will follow a traditional Buck Showalter strategy of waiting to see what happens tonight before announcing their starter for tomorrow.
“[The result will] have some bearing,” manager Buck Showalter said, via SNY. “We know what we’re planning to do, but some things are dictated by tomorrow night’s game. Game 2 starter can be dictated by how we do tomorrow night. It could be similar to what San Diego is doing.”
Actually, San Diego isn’t messing around. They announced Blake Snell as the Game 2 starter, meaning Joe Musgrove will go on Sunday, if necessary.
Perhaps this is all gamemanship by the Mets, as Showalter hinted at in telling reporters, “I'm certainly not going to broadcast that to the Padres.”
Either way, there is benefit in waiting on Friday’s outcome before announcing their Game 2 starter. If Scherzer does his job and wins tonight, it’s tempting to hold back Jacob deGrom until Sunday with the possibility he won’t need to pitch in this series at all, and he could then start Games 1 and 5 of the NLDS on regular rest.
If the Mets are down 1–0 in the series, obviously it’s all hands on deck and deGrom would need to pitch. Chris Bassitt would then pitch on Sunday.
“They know. We talked about this a week ago, at least,” Showalter said of deGrom and Bassitt. “They’ve been aware for a long time where it falls. It’s like if you’re rained out, are you able to pitch? They know the order, how it may fluctuate. It’s been the strength of our club, guys don’t let egos get in the way of it.”
🍎 ROSTER DECISIONS: Add the final postseason roster to things we don’t know yet. The Mets have until 12:00 PM EST today to set their roster for the wild-card series. It will be interesting to see who is healthy and whether they carry 12 or 13 pitchers.
▪️ Is Marte Playing? While it seems unlikely, as of yesterday, the Mets haven’t ruled out Starling Marte from contributing in this series. “He can grip things,” GM Billy Eppler said. “We’re still waiting and see how he comes along.” Eppler was evasive in answering whether Marte actually swung a bat or was able to throw a baseball. Again, it seems unlikely, but we will see.
▪️ Will Álvarez Make the Roster? There’s a good chance. If the Mets carry 14 hitters, and Marte isn’t one of them, it pretty much guarantees either Mark Vientos or Álvarez would make the roster. With Vientos giving them depth on the corner, they could decide to leave Álvarez off in favor of an extra outfielder in Darin Ruf.
When asked about Ruf’s status yesterday, Showalter gave a classic no response:
“Everyone here today has a shot…all of God’s children have a chance. They’re all somebody’s son.”
▪️ Who Makes the Bullpen? We know the Mets will carry at least three starters, but the question is whether they should carry a fourth (perhaps Carlos Carrasco since Taijuan Walker could be held back for the NLDS).
If they carry four starters, that leaves eight bullpen spots. Six are locks in Edwin Díaz, Adam Ottavino, Seth Lugo, Trevor May, Drew Smith and Joely Rodríguez. You can probably add David Peterson to that mix. That leaves one open spot. Trevor Williams pitched six innings on Wednesday so probably isn’t an option this weekend. Tylor Megill can technically come back off the COVID-IL as another option. Otherwise, it would seem Mychal Givens is the eighth piece.
🏁 The Mets finished with the third best record in the National League and they are rewarded with a short series against a team that boasts one of the strongest rotations in the tournament. There are few teams that can go toe-to-toe with the Mets top three of deGrom, Scherzer and Bassitt. The Padres are one of them. Besides that, they put forward a dangerous lineup with name-brand stars. And the back of their bullpen is quite formidable. It’s going to be a challenging series.
At times it seems as if San Diego general manager A.J. Preller manages his roster like he’s playing fantasy baseball. That was definitely true this past summer when he blew up the trade deadline by acquiring superstar Juan Soto, elite closer Josh Hader, slugger Josh Bell, and utility hitter Brandon Drury.
As much excitement as those moves generated, things didn’t exactly work out as planned. The Padres stumbled after the deadline, at one point losing 12 of 19 in August, turning a 12-game deficit behind the Dodgers into a nearly 20-game gap within a few weeks. To make matters worse, they soon found out superstar Fernando Tatis Jr. had tested positive for PEDS, resulting in an 80-game suspension.
From there, the Padres have tried to find their way, but still haven’t clicked on all cylinders. They won eight out of ten in the middle of September, but quickly came back down to earth, losing five of their final eight games of the regular season. They are a pedestrian 32–27 since August 1.
I thought you said this would be a challenging series?!
I did. Despite the unspectacular results over the past two months, the Padres remain a team that could blossom into its full potential at any moment. The Mets better hope it’s not over the next three days.
Sooner or later Juan Soto is going to hit better than .212 with a .346 slugging percentage, like he has over the past 30 games. Add his potential for a big series to the re-emergence of closer Josh Hader, who has found his footing after a rocky few months, and the shutdown capability of starters Yu Darvish, Blake Snell and Joe Musgrove, and you start to realize the threat.
⚾️ KEY MATCH-UPS
Digging deeper into the Padres’ offense, Juan Soto might have been placed into the perfect situation to make his first real mark with his new team. The Mets are familiar with him from his time with the Nationals. And Mr. Soto is very familiar with them. In fact, he has a career .350/.464/.709 slash line with 10 home runs in 103 at-bats at Citi Field.
Hitting in front of Manny Machado, and lacking a trustworthy situational lefty out of the pen, it will be hard to counter Soto late in games. The Mets will rely on their starters to turn the lineup as much as possible, and hope they can deploy Adam Ottavino and Edwin Díaz in the right spots.
Perhaps the best way to think about the Padres’ offense is to look at their lineup in terms of these potential match-ups.
This is how San Diego could look tonight against Scherzer. I considered handedness and recent match-up history (stats since 2021) in listing the “favorable” bullpen match-ups. Obviously, Díaz is a great match-up against everyone. Ottavino is right behind him. But there are a few spots where Lugo, Smith, Rodríguez and Peterson make sense.
As you can see, left-handed pitching isn’t going to help you much against the Padres. Their lineup is fairly balanced and they have several right-handed options off the bench. The Mets will obviously lean on their top two starters to pitch as late into the game as possible. A quintessential Scherzer start lasts at least seven innings tonight. If Scherzer is cruising, you let him cruise.
Where Showalter will start to look to his bullpen is when the top of the order swings around for a third or fouth time. As noted above, ideally Ottavino and Díaz are the only relievers tasked with retiring the most dangerous part of the order. It doesn’t always work out that way, so perhaps they can sneak in a lefty for the final out of an inning. Juan Soto is 0-for-3 with a walk against Joely Rodríguez this season. He has also struggled a bit against David Peterson (1-for-6 with two strikeouts).
Adam Ottavino has handled Manny Machado well throughout his career (0-for-8), but most of those match-ups were several years ago. If they have to go with someone else, both Drew Smith and Seth Lugo have had recent success against Machado (combined 0-for-6 with 3 strikeouts over the past two seasons).
Josh Bell has struggled since arriving in San Diego, but traditionally has been a difficult match-up. He has beaten up on pretty much everyone in the Mets’ bullpen except Díaz (0-for-4 with 2 strikeouts). Since 2021, he is a combined 5-for-8 against May, Ottavino, Lugo and Smith.
⚾️ TONIGHT’S STARTER: YU DARVISH
If you’re reading this newsletter, you know Yu Darvish. He has dominated the Mets throughout his career. He beat them twice this season, holding them to one run over 14 innings.
He is also entering the playoffs pitching as well as anybody in baseball. He was named the National League Pitcher of the Month for September with a 5–1 record and 1.85 ERA. He hasn’t allowed more than three runs in a game since the middle of August.
For the Mets to have success off Darvish, they need to jump on his cutter. If the lefties in the lineup don’t do damage off his cutter early in the count, they will likely fall victim to his splitter that dives away from the plate.
Darvish’s eclectic mix of pitches — he throws three different versions of his cutter — allows him to work deep into games, while keeping hitters guessing. He has gone 23 consecutive starts of at least six innings, helping to shorten the burden on the bullpen, which I will talk about next.
🚪 KNOW THE OPPONENT: BULLPEN
Behind Darvish, the Padres have Josh Hader looming in the back of the ‘pen. Getting to Hader can be a bit of an adventure, and where the Mets must hope to pounce. Right-hander Robert Suarez has been the most effective set-up man of late. However, he runs into command issues from time-to-time. Besides Suarez, manager Bob Melvin can call upon right-handers Luis García and Nick Martinez in key spots.
Favorable to the Mets, besides Hader, the Padres lack a dominant left-hander out of the pen. Tim Hill has developed into the go-to lefty specialist, but has had some rough outings over the final few weeks of September. They also have young southpaw Adrian Morejon, who has also struggled down the stretch and is on the bubble to make the postseason roster.
📈 ONE LAST STAT: As the Mets enter the postseason with two bona-fide aces, Tim Britton of The Athletic did some research and found an interesting stat:
Of the 16 teams to enter the postseason since 1995 with a pair of starters who each posted at least six wins above replacement (bWAR) during the regular season, only one, the 2001 Diamondbacks, went on to win the World Series. Overall, the 16 teams went 13–15 in the postseason.
To be clear, neither Max Scherzer nor Jacob deGrom posted 6+ win seasons due to their respective injuries. But you get the idea. Having two dominant regular season starters doesn’t guarantee a world series championship.
🔗 NL Wild Card Series Preview: Mets vs Padres, by Jay Jaffe, FanGraphs: “This is a matchup that features a whole lot of quality starting pitching and a couple of MVP candidates, but the Mets have a much deeper and more potent lineup. Anything can happen in this goofy best-of-three format, but I do expect the 101-win team to prevail.”
🔗 What should worry the Mets about the Padres — and what they can exploit, by Joel Sherman, NY Post: “This time the star-power led San Diego to its first playoff berth in a 162-game season since 2006. And this kind of star power makes them particularly dangerous in a short series. With the help of a scout, a coach and an executive with a lot of experience studying the Padres, let’s drill down on the challenge the Mets are facing over the weekend at Citi Field.”
🔗 Can Mets manager Buck Showalter finally emerge from October with a ring? by Tim Britton, The Athletic ($): “A championship over the next month could be the final polish on a Hall of Fame plaque for the 66-year-old Showalter. He’s won Manager of the Year three times with a good shot this season at a fourth. The Mets are the fourth different team he’s taken to the postseason.”
🔗 Jeff McNeil Swings Softly, But Carries a Big Stick, by Chris Gilligan, FanGraphs: “McNeil has generated his value with a set of skills very different from those of your typical modern All-Star or 5.9-WAR player. In a home run era, he’s been as far from a power hitter as an All-Star gets. He finished 2022 with nine home runs, including two in his final three games, making him just the third player in the last decade to amass as many as 5.5 WAR without clearing the fence 10 times. He hit 23 home runs in 2019, the homer-happiest season in major league history, but even with that outlier included, he’s still gone deep in just 2.3% of his big league plate appearances.”
And we close this one out with memories of some Mets’ postseason magic on this date…
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Lets Go Mets - It wont be easy but this is the playoffs - exciting !
Oh JB. The Agbayani clip! Perfect! That’s what’s coming starting tonight! Citi Field will be shaking at from its foundation! Let’s Go Mets!!!!!!