World Series shifts to NY: G3 preview
Friday night promises us Game 3 of the 2015 World Series between the Royals and Mets at Citi Field in New York. Here are the essentials …
World Series Game 3, Royals at Mets, Royals lead series 2-0
8:07 p.m. ET; TV: Fox
Pitching matchup: Yordano Ventura (163 1/3 IP, 4.08 ERA, 2.69 K/BB) vs. Noah Syndergaard (150 IP, 3.24 ERA, 5.35 K/BB)
And here’s how these two have fared thus far in the 2015 postseason …
So … a must-win for the Mets? It’s not in the most literal of senses, obviously, but the stakes are indeed high. How high? Historically, the team down 2-1 in a best-of-seven series has gone on to win said series 29.2 percent of the time. Meantime, teams down 3-0 in a best-of-seven go on to prevail just 2.9 percent of the time (the 2004 Red Sox are of course the lone example of this happening). Stated another way, if the Mets win Game 3, then their odds of winning the World Series, at least based on historical outcomes, are roughly 10 times greater than if they lose Game 3.
As for the match-ups, Ventura’s overall postseason numbers this time around aren’t strong, as you can see above. He’s coming off his strongest start of the playoffs — his ALCS Game 6 outing against Toronto — but he lasted just 5 1/3 innings before Ned Yost, quite understandably, quick-hooked him. In recent starts, Ventura has been featuring his high-velo fastball less and less and giving hitters more frequent looks at his curve, cutter, and sinker. He does this periodically, but it’s increasingly become his approach as the playoffs have progressed.
Something else to watch for? Last time out against the Jays, Ventura started off from the stretch and mixed up his delivery as the game went on. The Mets — particularly since acquiring Yoenis Cespedes, giving regular duty to Michael Conforto, and getting David Wright and Travis d’Arnaud back from injury — have a potent offense, so perhaps Ventura will experiment similarly in Game 3.
On the other side, the 23-year-old Syndergaard will be making his third start of the playoffs (to go with one relief appearance). During the regular season, Syndergaard was much better at home: 2.46 ERA and 8.60 K/BB at Citi Field versus a 4.23 ERA and 3.81 K/BB elsewhere. It’s too early in his career to read too much into those splits, but it bears mentioning. In the postseason, he was also much stronger in his home start against the Cubs in the NLCS than he was in his road start against the Dodgers in the NLDS.
During the regular season, Syndergaard threw first-pitch strikes 64.3 percent of the time versus a league-average mark of 60.9 percent. When it comes to first pitches, Syndergaard goes with the fastball or sinker almost 70 percent of the time. Given the way the Royals have been ambushing first pitches in this series, it’ll be interesting to see whether Syndergaard goes with first-pitch breaking balls on occasion or tries to get chase swings on fastballs out of the zone.
We’ll find out that and more in a matter of hours.
(USATSI)
This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service – if this is your content and you’re reading it on someone else’s site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/content-only/faq.php#publishers.
