Chris Capuano makes his regular season starting debut for the New York Mets (3-4) against the Washington Nationals (3-4) tonight (7:10 p.m. EST, SNY) hoping to put an end to the Mets' current three-game losing streak. The Nationals will send their own left-hander, Tom Gorzelanny, to the mound.
The Mets' demise of late has been due to their starting pitchers giving up far too many runs early and not pitching deep enough in games. The bullpen is starting to get overworked as well. Plus, the team itself has struggled mightily with runners in scoring position, going 0-for-10 yesterday.
Capuano made a relief appearance earlier this season, going two-thirds of an inning, allowing three hits and a run. He is 1-2 with a 3.58 ERA against Washington in his career. Capuano sports an underwhelming fastball but he has a decent changeup, and a slider as well that makes it play up. When he's on, he useually has good command, will give up about a hit per inning and will have a strikeout rate around seven per nine innings. Mets could use at least six innings from him today.
Gorzelanny is similar to Capuano in that he's not overpowering and is also a fastball-slider-changeup guy. He is 2-3 with a 5.11 ERA against the Mets in his career and is far less overpowering than yesterday's starter, Jordan Zimmerman, is. The Mets should be able to get some offense going in this one, but again the x-factor will be whether Capuano gives the team quality innings.
Current Series
Nationals lead the series 1-0
| Fri 04/08 |
WP: Jordan Zimmermann (1 - 1) LP: R.A. Dickey (1 - 1) |
2 - 6 loss |
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Washington Nationals Saturday, Apr 9, 2011, 7:10 PM EDT Tom Gorzelanny vs Chris Capuano Partly cloudy. Winds blowing in from right field at 5-10 m.p.h. Game time temperature around 55.
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| Sun 04/10 | 1:10 PM EDT | |
