NFL
By Monte Perez
The New York Mets will host the San Diego Padres in a best of 3 game series starting Friday night.
Game 1: 8/7/22, 8:07 PM on ESPN
Game 2: 8/8/22, 7:37 PM on ESPN
Game 3: 8/9/22, 7:37 PM on ESPN
San Diego:
The Padres were the most aggressive team at the trading deadline. They acquired Juan Soto and Josh Bell from the Washington Nationals. Soto is hitting .317 in his last 16 games. He is starting to get hot. Manny Machado carried this team all year long. He batted .298, hit 32 home runs, and had 102 RBI. This team has the potential to score runs in bunches. They were 11th in the major leagues, scoring 4.4 runs per game. They did this despite losing Fernando Tatis Jr. for the year. San Diego took 4 out of 6 games from New York and, 5 of the games were decided by 3 or more runs. Yu Darvish has owned the Mets. In 8 career starts, he has a record of 5-0 with a 2.56 ERA, including a 0.64 ERA this season. Darvis will be the Game 1 starter.
New York:
Photo Credit: (USA-Today).
The Mets ended the season in a virtual tie with the Atlanta Braves, and both teams compiled a record of 101-61. The Braves won the tiebreaker by defeating the Mets head-to-head, 10-9. It was New York’s 2nd best record in franchise history. On paper, the Mets look like a championship team. Jeff McNeil won the batting title, Pete Alonso had 40 home runs and 131 RBI, and Francisco Lindor had 27 home runs and over 100 RBI. The problem is they only have players 1-7 who are contributing offensively. Starling Marte will miss this series, which is a huge loss for New York. He was a reliable No.2 hitter all season long. Edwin Diaz should get some Cy Young votes. He has been the best reliever in all of baseball. In 62 innings pitched, he struck out 118 batters, walked 18, and had an ERA of 1.31.
Prediction:
All season long Mets fans kept saying, ” No one wants to face our pitching staff in the playoffs.”
The projected matchups:
The only way for New York to win is for Max Scherzer and Jacob deGrom to dominate the Padres. They have both looked tired in their last few starts. I got to believe these two Halls of Fame pitchers will come through for at least one series.
Mets win 2 games to 0.
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