There are not many days off during a 162-game baseball season, but the New York Mets are idle almost as much as they’re playing this season.
New York was scheduled to open a three-game series at Colorado on Friday night but a snowstorm that dropped several inches on the area starting late Thursday, as well as chilly temperatures, forced yet another postponement for the Mets.
The game will be made up as part of a doubleheader on Saturday, with the first game starting at 5:10 p.m. and the second game starting no more than 45 minutes after the completion of the first game.
It is the second straight day and fourth time since Sunday that New York has had a game postponed. Rain washed out Thursday’s game with Philadelphia.
Two weeks into the season, the Mets have completed eight games, which means it will have a heavily-loaded schedule down the road. New York is slated to play 16 games in a 15-day stretch in mid-to-late June.
“I don’t think it will be the first time ever that we’ll be facing something like that,” manager Luis Rojas said Thursday. “Right now we can take advantage of the seven-inning games when you play a doubleheader. It comes in handy, this rule.”
The scheduled pitching matchup for Friday, with the Mets sending Jacob deGrom against Chi Chi Gonzalez, will be the same for the first game. The nightcap will feature New York’s Joey Lucchesi against Colorado’s German Marquez.
This will be the second start of the season for deGrom (0-1, 0.64 ERA), who held the Miami Marlins to one run over eight innings and struck out 14 but took the hard-luck 3-0 loss on April 10.
He has faced Colorado seven previous times in his career — all starts — and is 4-1 with a 1.25 ERA in those matchups. Two of those starts came at Coors Field, where he is 1-1 with a 2.51 ERA.
Gonzalez (1-0, 3.60 ERA) is making his second start and fourth appearance of the season. Gonzalez has never faced the Mets. The journeyman has taken advantage of an opportunity created by Kyle Freeland’s injury with some solid work for the struggling Rockies.
Colorado has lost six straight, including a heartbreaker at the Los Angeles Dodgers on Thursday night when a 5-3 lead in the seventh turned into a 7-5 loss.
Walks have been an issue for Rockies pitchers this season. The staff has issued 66 free passes this season.
“There are a lot of things that go into this, but it’s very unsettling,” manager Bud Black said after Thursday’s game. “We have to throw more strikes, we have to throw more quality strikes.”
Lucchesi (0-0, 0.00) is making his second appearance and first start of the season for New York. He is familiar with Colorado from his three seasons with San Diego and is 2-3 with a 4.34 ERA in nine career starts against the Rockies.
Marquez (0-1, 4.02 ERA) is making his third start of the season. He is 2-0 with a 4.50 ERA in three career starts against the Mets.
