The New York Mets took an adventurous route last season to the National League Championship Series, where they fell to the eventual World Series champion Los Angeles Dodgers in six games.
The first six games this season against the Dodgers are evidence the Mets could be in line for a straighter path to the playoffs this time around.
The Mets will look to complete a series win over the Dodgers on Thursday afternoon when they visit Los Angeles in the clubs’ final regular-season meeting of the year.
New York left-hander David Peterson (4-2, 2.69 ERA) is slated to start against right-hander Landon Knack (3-2, 4.58).
Pete Alonso homered twice and finished with five RBIs while Griffin Canning tossed six scoreless innings Wednesday night for the Mets, who rolled to a 6-1 win.
The victory was the 10th in the past 13 games for the Mets — a stretch in which they have gone 4-2 against the Dodgers to clinch the season series, which would give New York home-field advantage should the teams meet in the playoffs after finishing with the same regular-season record.
At an NL-best 39-23, the Mets are in much better shape to mount a playoff push than they were a year ago at this time, when they were 26-35 and ahead of only the Miami Marlins and Colorado Rockies in the Senior Circuit.
New York went a major-league-best 63-38 after June 4 last year and clinched a wild-card berth by beating the Atlanta Braves in the opener of a makeup doubleheader played after the final scheduled day of the regular season.
“I can’t say this enough: (After) last year, we don’t want to be in the situation where we’re having to play extra games for whatever reason,” Alonso said. “We want to pick up as many games as possible, and this group understands that. We’re locked in and we’re just ready for the opportunity that we have (Thursday).”
The Dodgers, who have made the playoffs in each of the last 12 years, are accustomed to clinching a postseason berth with plenty of time to spare. This is just the third time in that span they’ve lost the season series to the Mets, who went 7-5 against Los Angeles in 2015 and 4-3 vs. the Dodgers in 2022.
The Dodgers lead the majors with 353 runs this season (5.7 per game) but are averaging just 3.3 runs per contest against the Mets. Los Angeles earned both wins in extra innings and has scored a total of 10 runs in the four defeats.
The Mets limited the Dodgers to five hits on Wednesday, when Andy Pages’ solo homer in the ninth prevented Los Angeles from being shut out for the fourth time this season and the first time since May 10.
“If you look back at the two series we’ve played against these guys, they’re pitching us really well — execution, sequencing, we’re certainly kind of one step behind as far as anticipating what they’re going to do,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said. “I don’t know the answer. I do know that you’ve got to give those guys credit for pitching us well.”
Peterson earned a win on Friday, when he allowed one run over 5 2/3 innings as the Mets beat the Rockies 4-2.
He is 2-0 with a 4.63 ERA in five regular-season games (four starts) against the Dodgers. He earned a win over Los Angeles on May 24 after surrendering two runs over a season-high 7 2/3 innings in New York’s 5-2 victory. The southpaw was also 0-0 with a 6.00 ERA in two games (one start) in last year’s NLCS.
Knack recorded a victory on Saturday after giving up one run over six innings as the Dodgers routed the New York Yankees 18-2.
He made his lone career appearance against the Mets on May 25, when he took the defeat after giving up one run over six innings in the Dodgers’ 3-1 loss.
–Field Level Media
