After last night’s disappointing defeat to the Washington Nationals, the Mets will rely on two rookie starting pitchers to keep them in the thick of the NL Wild Card race this weekend. While it’s not the ideal scenario for the Mets, they could have put forth a better effort towards last night’s game as they wasted a quality start by Noah Syndergaard. The Mets also have no other choice with Steven Matz on the shelf, and now Jacob deGrom expected to miss his next start with forearm inflammation. So now the team will turn to a  rookie tonight who has one career start under his belt in Robert Gsellman, and another rookie tomorrow in Seth Lugo, who has a little more experience coming out of the bullpen but still only has three career starts. While both pitchers have found success early for the Mets, it’s going to be a tall task handed to them this weekend.

The Mets are going to have to find a way to beat the Nationals this weekend one way or the other. They have dropped seven of their last eight matchups against the division leaders after dominating them in the second half of last season to make the postseason, and ultimately land in the World Series. While I understand they have two completely different teams, the Mets did not let Daniel Murphy beat them last night, something he’s had a hand in against the Mets all season long. Which goes back to last night’s wasted opportunity that I mentioned earlier.  The Mets will look to the trio who has carried them over the last two weeks, of Jose Reyes, Asdrubal Cabrera, and Yoenis Cespedes to navigate them through the next two games with two relatively inexperienced pitchers on the mound.