The New York Mets played the St. Louis Cardinals today at Digital Domain Park in their second game of the spring. Johan Santana started for the Mets and he looked really good. Aside from the few balls he threw in the dirt Santana looked very impressive. Santana threw 29 pitches over two innings giving up a hit and a walk. After his outing Santana stated: "Finally I had the opportunity to get the first game out of the way. It went well." He went on to say, "The way I feel right now. It is a good sign. Hopefully I will be back on the mound in 5 days."
R.A. Dickey came in the game after Santana hoping to keep up the nice pitching. Dickey went 2.0 innings striking out two batters and not allowing a hit. Dickey had his knuckleball moving today and was able to get hitters jammed which caused easy groundouts. This was a great two innings by Dickey who pitched very well.
The Mets offense scored a run in the third inning on a Jordany Valdespin sacrifice fly that scored Andres Torres. The Mets led 1-0 after the third inning. They extended their lead when Andres Torres plated three runs on his first triple of the spring. The Mets led 4-0 after Torres three run triple. This spring has started very well for Torres who is batting .750 in the first two games. He has run the bases perfectly and has made smart decisions defensively which can only help a team.
The Mets Jon Rauch had a rough outing as he gave up three hits on two runs in just one inning. He allowed the Cardinals to cut the Mets lead to 4-2. Rauch did have a strikeout in his appearance today. Following Rauch was Jeurys Familia who was hoping to give the Mets a nice look in his first appearance of the spring. Familia went 1.2 innings today, but struggled in his second inning as he allowed a grand slam to give the Cardinals the lead. Familia tired very quickly today and really struggled in his second inning. The Mets bought in Pedro Beato to try to tame the Cardinals hitters and he was able to get an out after allowing a double.
The Mets trailed 6-5 heading into the bottom of the seventh inning. And in that inning the Mets took the lead back on a Aderlin Rodriguez base hit. Which resulted in two runs scored on a throwing error by the Cardinals third basemen. The Mets took a 7-6 lead, but they weren’t done yet. Darrell Ceciliani doubled in a run that extended the Mets lead to 8-6. The offense in this game was much better then yesterday even though the Mets were handed opportunities on some terrible plays by the Cardinals.
The Mets pitcher Pedro Beato left the game in the 8th inning with an apparent right shoulder injury. He was replaced by D.J. Carrasco who dominated his inning of work as he struck out two batters. Carrasco pitched an easy 1-2-3 inning and really looked much better than last season with his performance today. The Mets really need Carrasco to pitch well this season even though he may not be with the club out of spring training.
The Mets played Brandon Nimmo today as he went 0-1 in his outing with the Mets. Nimmo walked in his first appearance, but grounded out to third in his second appearance.
Pitcher Josh Edgin recorded the two final outs of the day with two strikeouts. The Mets won the game 8-6 in a very spring training like game.
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