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<\/a>Philadelphia is coming off an impressive 10-4 win over Cincinnati to close out its most recent homestand and now looks to snap a four-game skid away from home.\u00a0 The Phillies are 4-2 against the Mets this season and will be making their first 2011 appearance at Citi Field.\u00a0 The club was shut out in the first four meetings at the venue last year before winning four of the final five.\u00a0 Second baseman Chase Utley may help the offense in this particular series after homering for the first time since October 10 on Thursday afternoon.\u00a0 \u201cWhen Utley gets going, that\u2019s definitely going to help our offense,\u201d Phillies manager Charlie Manuel stated.\u00a0 Utley went 2-for-14 in four games this week after missing the start of the season on the disabled list with a knee injury.\u00a0 Philadelphia is 12-3 versus left-handed starters this year.<\/p>\n
Phillies starting pitcher Roy Oswalt has registered a 3-2 record and 2.77 ERA in seven starts this season, but has failed to taste victory in his last three starts.\u00a0 Philadelphia has managed to give him just six runs of support over that span.\u00a0 The right-hander is coming off two solid efforts versus the Cardinals and Rangers, giving up just two runs and 15 hits over 12 frames.\u00a0 Oswalt enters with a 2-1 record and 3.15 ERA in four road outings and has yet to surrender a home run away from Citizens Bank Park in 20 innings.\u00a0 In 14 career starts versus the Mets, he has compiled a 6-5 mark and 3.33 ERA, including a shutout victory in his lone appearance at Citi Field.<\/p>\n
New York is hampered with injuries entering this important series against Philadelphia, but expect to have outfielder Angel Pagan back from the disable list tonight.\u00a0 He is expected to assume the starting center field position upon his return, but manager Terry Collins may ease him back in the lineup.\u00a0 \u201cI want to make sure he looks good, he looks like he\u2019s swinging good, that there\u2019s no hesitancy in his swing at all,\u201d Collins stated.\u00a0 The club will still be without the services of first baseman Ike Davis and David Wright due to injuries.\u00a0 Sluggers Jason Bay and Carlos Beltran will need to provide the offense, hitting .355 and .375 respectively against Oswalt.\u00a0 New York is 10-11 versus division opponents this year.<\/p>\n
Mets starter Chris Capuano will be making his 11th appearance (ninth start) of the season, bringing in a losing 3-5 mark and 5.36 ERA.\u00a0 The left-hander is allowing opponents to hit .294 against him and has allowed nine home runs in just 48 2\/3 innings.\u00a0 Capuano has compiled an even 2-2 record and 5.04 ERA in four home outings and hasn\u2019t thrown at Citi Field since May 4.\u00a0 In five career outings (four starts) against the Phillies, he is 0-2 with a 3.20 ERA, but has registered 21 strikeouts in 25 2\/3 frames.<\/p>\n
Bettors will be interested in backing the Mets due to their 5-2 record in their last seven home games, while the Phillies are 1-4 in Oswalt\u2019s last five starts<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Philadelphia Phillies and New York Mets meet in a three-game series starting tonight between National League East rivals at Citi Field Philadelphia Phillies at New York Mets Philadelphia is coming off an impressive 10-4 win over Cincinnati to close out its most recent homestand and now looks to snap a four-game skid away from […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":181,"featured_media":4976,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1444],"tags":[1535,4962,1736,43,98,1528],"class_list":["post-15817","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-headlines","tag-chase-utley","tag-chris-capuano","tag-citi-field","tag-new-york-mets","tag-philadelphia-phillies","tag-roy-oswalt"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15817","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/181"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15817"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15817\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15819,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15817\/revisions\/15819"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4976"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15817"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15817"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15817"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}