St. Lucie 3 - Palm Beach 2

Press Release:

PORT ST. LUCIE, Fla. (April 27, 2018) – The St. Lucie Mets rallied past the Palm Beach Cardinals for a 3-2 victory on Friday at First Data Field.

A trio of Mets relievers – Stephen Nogosek, Matt Blackham and Ryder Ryan – combined for 4.2 shutout innings in the comeback win.

The Mets jumped out to an early 1-0 lead on an Andres Gimenez solo home run in the first inning.

Palm Beach’s Ryan McCarvel answered in the fourth with a two-run blast off of Mets starter Blake Taylor to put the Cardinals up 2-1.

The Mets came back in the sixth. Gimenez, Ian Strom and Luis Carpio drew walks from reliever Paul Balestrieri to load the bases. Dash Winningham hit a sinking liner to left that fell for a hit to bring in Gimenez for the tying run.

With the bases reloaded, Mike Paez lofted a sac fly to right field that plated Strom for the go-ahead run.

That was enough for the Mets bullpen. Nogosek fired 2.2 perfect innings. He retired all eight batters he faced, including three on strikeouts.

Blackham tossed perfect eighth with a strikeout.

Ryan struck out Brian O’Keefe for the second out of the ninth and catcher Dan Rizzie caught Dylan Carlson stealing second base to end the game. Ryan is now 2 for 2 in save chances.

Winningham went 2 for 4. Jacob Zanon hit a double for the third straight game.

Taylor allowed two runs in 4.1 innings. He walked three and struck out three.

Palm Beach starter Ian Oxnevad gave up one run in five innings.

The game was delayed by rain for 30 minutes in the bottom of the first. Both teams were able to stick with their starting pitchers.

The Mets (10-11) and Cardinals (11-11) play the third game of their series at First Data Field on Saturday.