PRE-GAME: Kodai Senga Makes 2026 Debut vs. the Cardinals | Mark Vientos Grabs First Start

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Before the game, especially as we have a little bit of a later start, 7.45 tonight.

Here we go.

Let's get right to the starting lineup.

Before we'll talk a little more about Kodai Sanke and make it his season debut.

An interesting line up to the New York Mets are putting out there tonight.

Top three, same as it's been all season, Lendor, Soto, the Shet.

Adding clean up, you got Luis Robert Jr., you got Jerry Young back in the lineup again,

and he is starting at first.

Mark Viantos gets his first start of the season, batting six, D.H.ing, Marcus Simian continues

in the 7th hole and playing second-based Carson Bench continues to get every start in

right field.

And Luis Lorenz is the starting catcher with Kodai Sanke.

I think the big thing that jumps out is Mark Viantos gets a start against a righty.

We were wondering why Jerry Young got in line up yesterday over Viantos, even though Kyle

Leahy had splits that favor, putting lefties in the lineup, you still would have thought

that Viantos who hadn't gotten his start yet this year might have gotten a nod to be

in the starting lineup.

It's not like Mark Viantos can't hit right-handed pitching, and as I talked about on this

morning show, you look at Viantos' career, he's actually homeworked more frequently

against right-handed pitchers than left-handed.

Granted, he has for a higher average against lefties and does have slightly better numbers

overall, but Viantos can't hit home runs against anybody.

So I was a little surprised that he wasn't in a lineup yesterday, and Jerry Young was.

Jerry Young ended up proving to be the right call, had that RBI double.

Now the match ends up going back to Jerry Young, give Brett Baby a blow, and Mark Viantos

does get in the lineup.

The one thing to note here, Andre Palante is going for the Cardinals, and Viantos is

two for four in a square against Palante, and he's hit a home run.

He's the only man who has homeworked in his career against Palante, who hasn't really

faced him that much.

The only guys who have gotten a ton of that bass against him, and by a ton, I'm talking

12-13 of that, is Francisco Lendor and Tyrone Taylor.

I'm sure a lot of those at that, I would imagine go back to the 2023 season when Tyrone

Taylor is with the Brewers in Palante, obviously, with the Cardinals.

You look at their numbers, both those guys have hit very well against Palante.

Lendor is six for 13 with three walks, Tyrone Taylor is six for 12, but he still is waiting

for his first start.

If I had to guess, that probably comes against the left-handed pitcher, that's your liberator

who's going to be going tomorrow afternoon, and I imagine we'll probably see Carson Benge

get his first down the bench.

I'll be curious if Brett Baby gets two days on the bench, and Mark Viantos gets in there.

Tonight's lineup, you obviously notice, no Jorge Palanco, but they talked about Palanco

having a little bit of an Achilles issue, so resting up his Achilles a little bit, giving

him a day off his feet.

You probably didn't want to start Palanco day game after a night game, so this way, as

you look at the starting lineup, you can have Palanco get a day off, but still be good

to go as one of the bats that you want to hit against lefties.

He'll be back out there, and my guess is he'll probably start at first base.

I do wonder how the meds view Viantos defensively.

Clearly, they think Jared Young is a better first baseman than Viantos is, otherwise Viantos

would be starting at first tonight instead of D.H., so I think that tomorrow, you'll probably

see Palanco in there at first, Viantos at D.H., and Brett Baby might get a couple days off

in our row here, which I don't entirely love.

I like Brett Baby getting plenty of time over Jared Young, but at the same time, Jared Young

has had some pretty good numbers over the past couple of years as a hitter, obviously

not in the big leagues, but hasn't got an extended run.

He doubled yesterday, and so maybe that is part of why they like this.

I'm sure they're probably just like the matchup.

They probably like the profile of Palante for Young compared to Badi, and maybe again,

they just want to get Badi a blow after he just played right field for the first time

night before, hadn't gotten a day off yet, and who knows, maybe Brett Baby is going

to start against the lefty the following day.

You do look at Palante's career splits, and it does make sense why you'd put more

righties in the lineup, even though he has a right handed pitcher.

Righties across Palante's career fit 288 against them lefties 242.

So definitely some reverse splits here, the odd base percentage, another big difference,

364 against righties, 304 against lefties, slug percentage, 423 against righties, 365 against

lefties.

So it makes a good amount of sense that you go and then you kind of stop the lineup with

right handed bats instead of trying to get lefties in there like they did the night

before against Kyle Laihi.

So good stuff there by the mats.

I'm also interested a little bit, and if Luis Terenz is a favorable catcher for Kodai

Sanga moving forward, I did have a question from one of the insiders before the season

started about, you know, about Terenz, and if there'd be a pitcher that he could be

a personal catcher for, I didn't really have an answer, but Kodai Sanga could be that.

So this allows you to catch Francisco Alvarez with Freddie Peralta.

Maybe you want to keep some consistency there.

Those guys already worked together once this season working, we're working together throughout

spring training.

So maybe you want to keep the familiarity going for Peralta.

And obviously again with the catcher, we're not going to go day game after night game.

This early in the season start Alvarez both.

So we knew he was going to be benched one of these games, and they choose this one Terenz

starts for with Kodai Sanga as his battery mate.

So one last time, we're going to read through this starting lineup, and then quick break

before we talk a little bit about Kodai Sanga again, Francisco Landoor, batting lead off

Juan Soto, Boba Shit, same thing there, Luis Robert scratches the top four for the first

time.

So up in that, I would imagine would continue, I think you would potentially bat him

clean up when you have a lefty on the mound on Wednesday, Jared Young gets back out there

and mark the Antos, Marcus Simeon Carson Benj and Luis Terenz with Kodai Sanga on the

hill.

And that is the bigger story of the day, Kodai Sanga making his first start of the season.

We'll talk about that here in just a minute.

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All right, let's talk a little bit about Kodai saying, it's coming off a great spring

where he looked like the best version of Kodai saying, and now he gets to put it to

the test against a real lineup, big league game, all the true pressure, games that count.

And I'm really excited to watch him pitch, not a ton of experience against the Cardinals

either.

Kind of got the clean slate against a lot of these guys.

Alex Burleson has six at best.

That's the most of any Cardinals hitter against Sangat.

He's over six with a pair of walks in a pair of strikeouts.

No one bore him in has five at bats.

He's over five with three strikeouts.

Everyone else has gone two at bats against Sangat.

So you're looking at a lineup that doesn't know Sangat well.

And we'll see what the 2026 version of Kodai Sangat looks like.

We saw the velocity was there this spring, kind of the opposite of what has been

happening with Shamanaya for Sangat.

We saw him sit in 95, touch in 97.

You see that ghost fork that just disappears.

His ability to use his cutter to pound the strike zone slider.

You've got a curve ball that he dumped in there like a e-fist looking curve ball that

he was able to use in the steel strike.

So there's a lot the Kodai Sangat has in his arsenal.

And he has as much upside as any starter in this rotation.

So right now, sure, he's your fifth starter in theory.

But that's a really good place to start with this rotation.

First time through, the meds have gotten very good starting pitching overall.

I have Freddie Peralta.

I think you know, the most earned runs with four on opening days.

They've got the win really gritty performance by Peralta on a day where

Paul Schien's got jumped and gave up a ton of runs.

He had Freddie Peralta hanging in there and getting you through five.

You've then seen David Peters to put together a solid performance.

Of course, Clay Holmes went last night.

He pitched pretty well.

I'm like an old McLean, not his best performance with solid solid star.

So first time through this rotation has looked pretty good.

Kodai Sangat has a chance to really put a stamp on this turn through the rotation

and show that the meds are here to play.

And they have a rotation that they're really going to like.

So Kodai Sangat's going to be fun to watch and pitch.

I imagine you're looking at 85 pitches max for Sangat.

But if he's on, that can still get him through six.

And honestly, length out of Sangat would be a very good thing for the New York

match. Look at the state of the bullpen right now.

Devon Williams and Brooks Raleigh both pitched yesterday.

And if they pitched again, they'd be going three times in four days.

That is something that teams try to avoid.

If it's a one run game and you could win a series,

I could still see Devon Williams going back out there.

But I imagine Brooks Raleigh will not pitch in this game.

And also would not be surprised if there was a save opportunity that it might

go to Luke Weaver instead of Devon Williams if they wanted to keep Williams from

going again, throwing three times in four days.

Well, it's got a browser bond, got a day off so you'd figure he'd be good to go.

Luis Garcia and Dickie Love Lady, they both got a day off.

So you'd think they'd be good to go.

But that's pretty much the city of the bullpen right now.

You got those four arms and then you got guys that'd be pitching back-to-backs

that might not do it.

Tobias Myers is not going to pitch a back-to-back.

I think the whole year he won't pitch a back-to-back.

Sean Manaya probably needs more than a day to help out,

even though he didn't throw a ton of pitches.

So I don't know.

I guess if it's his throw-deb, I don't think it would be.

He pitched on what that was Sunday, so yeah, he's not going to go.

So that's pretty much what you got, a little bit of a lighter bullpen.

So it is pretty imperative that Cody Sanga gives them that's a little bit of length.

But if you can get them at least 15 outs, browser bond can come on.

Get you at least three, but who knows, maybe even a little more than that.

I mean, you can piece this thing together and again, if you had to go to Devon Williams

on a back-to-back in three times and four nights, I think they would.

I'd be very surprised if we saw Brooks really, though.

And so that's the one thing about this team

that I'm very curious to watch play out over the first couple weeks of the season,

especially when you have a stretch like this one,

where it's nine games and nine days.

When Sean Manaya is not available,

Tobias Myers has already been used.

Now your eight-man bullpen, it's a six-man bullpen.

And it can get taxed pretty quick.

So it's just more pressure for the starting pitchers to give you some length.

And maybe Cody Sanga is the first match starter that goes through six innings in a game.

We'll see. We'll see if that's what the match get in this one.

It should be a lot of fun to see if this team can go out there,

keep the momentum, win another series,

going to be excited to watch Mark Viantos going to start.

See if he's got a chip on his shoulder and what he can do with it,

because that's maybe the best place to put Mark Viantos.

You put him in a corner, he might just bash his way out of it.

So I'm excited to see what he's going to do with the start.

I'm excited to see Luis Robert getting a start in the cleanup spot.

And just to see what that top four is going to look like,

because it's a little different than Polanco in there.

And honestly, if Luis Robert continues to hit,

I know you like to go left, right, left, that whole deal.

But at the same time, if Robert continues to break this season,

you're going to want to put him further and further up that lineup.

You never know exactly where you end up settling in on the further

and further you get into the season.

But that is, you were locked on Metz game preview.

Appreciate all of you who tuned in live for any of you who will catch

the playback on YouTube or wherever you're at your podcast.

Let me know in the comments section if you like these types of live streams.

I can keep on doing them to give you a pre-game show before most Metz games.

I don't know if I'll do all 162, but it's something the audience likes.

I'll definitely make an effort to continue to do it.

Break down the starting lineup each day and talk about the keys to the game.

So appreciate all of you for tuning in.

Make sure you follow right in review wherever you get your podcasts.

Chris Schubert will have you live on YouTube for a post-game stream

as soon as the final out goes tonight.

And I will have a full recap for you all tomorrow morning at 6 a.m. on YouTube

whenever you get your podcasts.

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