Final Score: Mets 5, Phillies 2

I talked about how David Wright loves hitting in Philly in the series preview. Well the CEO of Citizens Bank Park hit a first inning solo home run to give us the 1-0 lead, and he added a second solo dinger in the top of the 9th for our fifth run. He now has 22 career long balls at Citizens Bank.

I talked in the series preview about how Lucas Duda has been his typical streaky self so far this season. So far he’s been streaking in the bad direction. That was until he broke out tonight. He had an opposite field double in the 6th inning to drive in Yoenis Cespedes making it 2-1. Then in the 8th inning, he launched his first home run. The exit velocity was 112 MPH. It was an absolute laser bomb. And Neil Walker went back to back with an opposite field solo shot to make it 4-1. Walker leads the team with 4 home runs. We already knew that Neil Walker had a hell of an MLB resume. But he’s come out of the gate strong in New York and had real positive results. That’s huge and not every player who comes here can say that.

The offense was great to see tonight considering we didn’t support Noah Syndergaard in his last dominant performance. Tonight he went 7 innings, gave up a run, and struck out 8. Thor is really on another level in 2016. He was dominating all spring, and he’s kept that going into the season. He’s striking out everyone. Right now, we are lucky to be witnessing his dominance. I hope this is the start to a special season for him, and ultimately a special career.

Philly Can Pitch: Jerad Eickhoff was not too shabby tonight in his matchup against Syndergaard. He almost matched him frame for frame going 7 innings, giving up 2 runs and striking out 9. His hammer rivaled that of Thor. Between his three quality starts against us in 2015 and his two solid outings this season, he’s showing the Mets that the Phillies starting rotation needs to be taken seriously.

Cappy Keeps Raking, Grandy Keeps Mopping: Asdrubal Cabrera had 3 hits tonight. He’s batting .349. Curtis Granderson went 0-4 with 2 Ks. He’s hitting .143. The law of averages is such a real thing. The Grandy/Cappy roller coaster ride to .260 should be fun. 

Natural Born Reliever: Antonio Bastardo aka Anthony Sand struck out the side in the 8th inning. His velocity looked good as he was hitting 93 MPH. His three pitch strikeout of Maikel Franco was straight up nasty.

Tomorrow: Vincent Velasquez will be tough tomorrow. With Eickhoff and Velasquez, the Phillies have starters that strike people out, and we have some hitters that are susceptible to the K. Hopefully Logan Verrett keeps us in this game like he did in his last spot start and our offense continues to display the power.