Sean Manaea fans seven in victory over Guardians

Manaea didn’t allow any free passes while continuing his remarkable in-season turnaround. He opened the year in the bullpen and has only improved since joining the rotation in mid-June. Notably, his velocity has steadily increased the more he starts. The Pirates have scuffled lately, but they’ve scored the third-most runs in MLB this season. Manaea’s next start lines up at home against the Nationals.

Manaea struck out four, walked two, and allowed five hits. He served up a two-run homer to Matt Olson but limited the damage otherwise. He’s now made nine starts since returning to the Mets rotation on June 13, and his ERA is under 4 during that stretch. It isn’t dominant, but it’s a big improvement from where things were earlier this season. Manaea’s next start is scheduled to come in Cleveland.

Manaea held his own with an impressive showing against the Dodgers last Friday, allowing just one run over six innings. It’ll be burgeoning star Christian Scott taking the ball opposite Braves ace Chris Sale during Wednesday’s nightcap at Citi Field. Get your popcorn ready for that one.

This was a great start by Manaea against a tough Dodgers lineup. He did get some help from right fielder Carson Benge who threw one runner out at home and started another relay to get one at third, but don’t let that take too much away from Manaea’s outing. His fastball led the charge with a 61% usage rate – nearly double his season average – and he had no problem crowding hitters from both sides of the plate with it. It also sat right at 91 mph, a big deal for Manaea after struggling to both build up and maintain his velocity earlier in the season. With it and his confidence to challenge hitters in the zone back, he has turned in a 3.75 ERA over his last 13 outings dating back to May 17th. Next up is a meeting with the Braves at home.

Manaea gave up seven hits, walked two and struck out seven. He fell to 2-5 with the loss. Manaea ran into trouble immediately, allowing a single to Trea Turner and a two-run home run to Kyle Schwarber before recording his first out. It didn’t get much better from there as Manaea allowed another home run, this one to Turner in the fifth inning. In seven starts since moving into the rotation, he has a 4.48 ERA with 36 strikeouts in 36 2/3 innings. Manaea is lined up to face the Dodgers at home next weekend.

Manaea struck out six and walked one while throwing 70 percent of his pitches for strikes. He recorded just eight whiffs and an eight percent swinging strike rate on the day, so it wasn’t a dominant outing, but he filled the zone with strikes on his fastballs and was able to get strikeouts on the few times he did get into two-strike counts. Things get tougher for him with the Brewers and Dodgers up after the All-Star break.

Manaea gave up a solo homer to Eli White in the second inning. The Braves then got to him in the third for three runs on a walk, a hit batter, and three hits. Mauricio Dubon would extend the lead with a solo homer in the fourth. Manaea would give the Mets one more scoreless inning, ending his day after five with four strikeouts. The 34-year-old left-hander will take a 5.16 ERA, 1.37 WHIP, and a 68/23 K/BB ratio across 68 innings into a start against the Royals in New York on Thursday.

It was not one of Manaea’s better velocity days, as he was down to 90.4 mph tonight after coming in at 91.2-91.5 mph in each of his previous three starts. That’s definitely something to watch. Manaea seems like a decent enough bet as a bottom-of-the-rotation mixed-league option when he’s above 91 mph, but not so much if he’s back to 89-90 mph, as he typically was as a reliever at the start of the year. He’ll get the Braves this weekend.

This poor result was partially not having great command and partially his defense utterly failing him. The Mets made six total errors in this game – all on the infield – and two were made behind Manaea. Past that, Brett Baty ran into the wall in right field on a ball that could’ve been caught and Bo Bichette over-charged a bunt from Pete Crow-Armstrong that sailed right past him. That wound up being Manaea’s last batter in an ugly outing, but we can hang our hats on the fact that his fastball still sat above 91 mph and he forced 10 swings-and-misses. He’s scheduled to face the Blue Jays next time out.

McLean will have his scheduled start pushed back an extra day in the wake of Monday’s rainout at Citi Field. It also eliminates the possibility of a two-start week where he would’ve had to face the red-hot Phillies this weekend. It’ll be Sean Manaea taking the ball for the other contest during Wednesday’s twin bill before Freddy Peralta starts Thursday’s series finale.