Mets starting pitcher Johan Santana is 8-5 with a 3.11 ERA in 22 starts this season, but is coming off one of his worst outings of the year.\u00a0 In his last appearance, he allowed seven runs and 13 hits in 5.2 innings, while managing to strike out just two batters.\u00a0 The left-hander is an even 2-2 with a 2.77 ERA in 11 road starts, as opponents are hitting for a combined .234 against him away from Citi Field.\u00a0 Santana made six starts in July, posting a perfect 3-0 mark and 2.06 ERA.\u00a0 In 10 career starts against the Braves, he has a disappointing 2-5 record, but has compiled a solid 2.77 ERA.\u00a0 He tossed seven shutout innings in a 3-0 home victory over Atlanta four starts back, scattering five hits and striking out five.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n Atlanta finished its nine-game road trip with a 3-6 record, dropping Sunday\u2019s contest 2-1 at Cincinnati.\u00a0 The Braves still lead the division by 2.5 games, but they began the road trip with a seven-game lead.\u00a0 \u201cWe need to pick it up and start hitting a bit,\u201d said manager Bobby Cox.\u00a0 The lineup has produced a combined batting average of .236 over the last seven games, but the team is still hitting .260 for the season.\u00a0 Atlanta is an even 19-19 against divisional opponents (-420) and the total is 12-23 O\/U in those games.\u00a0 The Braves are also an even 17-17 versus southpaw starts and Cox will certainly find room for Matt Diaz in the lineup tonight.\u00a0 He is a lifetime .538 hitter (14-for-26) against Santana.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n Braves starting pitcher Tim Hudson is 11-5 with a 2.40 ERA in 21 starts this season and is coming into this outing on a two-game winning streak.\u00a0 In those two starts, he has managed to give up just a single run and 11 hits over 14.2 innings.\u00a0 The right-hander is 6-3 with a 2.31 ERA in nine home starts, surrendering just three home runs in 62.1 innings of work.\u00a0 In 17 career starts versus the Mets, Hudson is a fantastic 11-5 with a 3.54 ERA, including tallying a 4-0 victory on July 10 at Citi Field.\u00a0 He finished last month with a 3-2 record and 2.48 ERA.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n The lines maker has elected to place Santana as an underdog in this contest, with the Mets posting a 3-7 record on the road when the total is 7 or less.\u00a0 The Braves are 5-7 in the same situation, but a terrific 8-2 as a home favorite of -125 to -150 (+500).<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The Braves lead in the NL East is now just 2.5 games as they host the struggling Mets at Turner Field. New York Mets at Atlanta Braves New York has dropped 15 of its last 21 games, including a 14-1 blowout loss to the last-place Arizona Diamondbacks on Sunday.\u00a0 \u201cIt definitely hurts your pride a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":181,"featured_media":4981,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1444],"tags":[243,42,43,1653,1651,1652],"class_list":["post-6031","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-headlines","tag-atlanta-braves","tag-johan-santana","tag-new-york-mets","tag-nl-east","tag-tim-hudson","tag-turner-field"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6031","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=6031"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6031\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6033,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6031\/revisions\/6033"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4981"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6031"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6031"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6031"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/06\/jason-heyward-braves-9900-150x150.jpg\")
New York has dropped 15 of its last 21 games, including a 14-1 blowout loss to the last-place Arizona Diamondbacks on Sunday.\u00a0 \u201cIt definitely hurts your pride a little bit when you perform in that manner,\u201d manager Jerry Manuel said.\u00a0 \u201cWe didn\u2019t pitch, we didn\u2019t hit, we didn\u2019t play defense.\u201d\u00a0 The Mets now head to a field where they\u2019ve dropped 15 of their last 20 meetings.\u00a0 The team has taken five of the first eight meetings between the two clubs, but they\u2019ve yet to win a season series over the Braves since the 2006 season.\u00a0 Offensively, the club is hitting just .210 with 54 runs scored and 15 home runs in 17 games since the All-Star break.\u00a0 New York is 19-20 against divisional opponents this season (-350) and the total is 16-22 O\/U in those contests.\u00a0 The Mets will try to avoid dropping to the .500 mark for the first time since June 2, when the team stood at 27-27.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n