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<\/a>New York has won two of its last three games, including a 5-3 victory on Friday night.\u00a0 The Mets are 25-12 in their last 37 contests dating back to May 22, which is the second-best mark in the majors over that span (Boston).\u00a0 Overall, the Mets are 17-23 (-410) on the road, but they have won two of three games away from Citi Field.\u00a0 New York has scored at least one run in the first inning in its last four games, producing a 37-14 mark when scoring first.\u00a0 The offense has been led by 3B David Wright\u2019s NL-leading 63 RBI, which ranks third in the majors.\u00a0 The Mets have not dropped a season series to the Nationals\/Expos franchise since 2003.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\nMets starting pitcher R.A. Dickey is 6-1 with a 2.98 ERA in eight appearances (six starts) this season (+450) and looks to bounce back from his first loss of the season.\u00a0 He allowed five runs and five hits in five innings of work in a 10-3 road loss to the Florida Marlins.\u00a0 Before that loss, the right-hander picked up six straight victories, with the club outscoring opponents 38-12 over that span.\u00a0 Dickey finished June 4-1 with a 3.06 ERA in five starts this season.\u00a0 The four wins finished tied for third-most in the majors during the month.\u00a0 He has allowed just two home runs this season in 51.1 innings pitched.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\nWashington has managed to score just six runs in three games while the team looks to improve upon its 21-17 home record (+460).\u00a0 The Nationals current home record may lead to a drastic improvement at the end of the year, with the club recording a 33-48 mark in 2009 and 34-46 in 2008.\u00a0 Playing against divisional rivals was a losing venture last year (21-32), but Washington stands at an even 14-14 this season (+700).\u00a0 The Nationals currently hold a 6-4 series lead heading into this nationally televised contest.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\nNationals starting pitcher Stephen Strasburg is an even 2-2 with a 2.27 ERA in five starts this season (-310).\u00a0 The right-hander will be making his fourth home start of the year, going 1-1 with a 1.80 ERA while striking out 33 batters and not issuing a single walk.\u00a0 He has gone 0-2 with a 2.33 ERA over his last three starts due to the offense providing just a run in support.\u00a0 \u201cI feel for him.\u00a0 I feel for our whole ball club,\u201d manager Jim Riggleman said.\u00a0 Strasburg has been brilliant in two daytime starts, posting a 1-1 record and 1.59 ERA.\u00a0 He will be making his first career start against the Mets this afternoon.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\nBettors must respect the Nationals 23-21 record this season after a loss (+780) despite the price, but their 8-17 mark against winning clubs tempers my willingness to fire away.\u00a0 \u00a0 The Mets are difficult to back with an 0-2 record as a road underdog of +150 to +175 (-200), but its 7-4 mark when the total is 7 or less is appealing.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The pressure is squarely placed on the Nationals offense with their young superstar on the hill. New York Mets at Washington Nationals New York has won two of its last three games, including a 5-3 victory on Friday night.\u00a0 The Mets are 25-12 in their last 37 contests dating back to May 22, which is […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":181,"featured_media":3966,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1444],"tags":[2103,2104,43,1653,1979,925,850],"class_list":["post-5217","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-headlines","tag-fox","tag-nationals-park","tag-new-york-mets","tag-nl-east","tag-r-a-dickey","tag-stephen-strasburg","tag-washington-nationals"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5217","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=5217"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5217\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5219,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5217\/revisions\/5219"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3966"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5217"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5217"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5217"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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<\/a>New York has won two of its last three games, including a 5-3 victory on Friday night.\u00a0 The Mets are 25-12 in their last 37 contests dating back to May 22, which is the second-best mark in the majors over that span (Boston).\u00a0 Overall, the Mets are 17-23 (-410) on the road, but they have won two of three games away from Citi Field.\u00a0 New York has scored at least one run in the first inning in its last four games, producing a 37-14 mark when scoring first.\u00a0 The offense has been led by 3B David Wright\u2019s NL-leading 63 RBI, which ranks third in the majors.\u00a0 The Mets have not dropped a season series to the Nationals\/Expos franchise since 2003.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n