At 1:40 p.m. ET Sunday at loanDepot park, the Mets sent Christian Scott to the mound against Tyler Phillips while manager Carlos Mendoza announced Juan Soto had been scratched from the lineup because of an illness.
The moment mattered because New York arrived in Miami trying to avoid a sweep: the Mets had dropped Friday’s game 2-1 and Saturday’s 4-1 to the miami marlins and had scored only four runs since Thursday. Scott opened the start with a solid but limited résumé — 19 2/3 innings over five starts, a 4.12 ERA, 3.65 FIP, a 1.475 WHIP and 25 strikeouts (11.4 K/9) — while Phillips was making his first start of the season after eight relief appearances in which he logged 30 innings with a sparkling 1.20 ERA, a 3.42 FIP, a 1.267 WHIP and a 342 ERA+ despite walking 16 batters.
Those numbers set the frame: the Mets’ offense was a problem coming in, and the Marlins’ decided-to-start reliever carried both dominance and a glaring control issue. Only two current Marlins had ever faced Scott in a big-league game — Xavier Edwards, who was 2-for-2 against him, and Otto Lopez, who was 0-for-3 with a strikeout — a small sample that nonetheless gave Miami at least a familiarity edge.
Carlos Mendoza confirmed the late scratch of Soto, removing one of New York’s few reliable run creators from the equation and forcing the Mets to reshuffle their lineup minutes before first pitch. Mendoza also said Jorge Polanco was taking live at-bats in Port St. Lucie and could go on a rehab assignment "pretty soon" if his progress continued, offering the club a possible boost to its offense in the near term.
Context is simple and stark: the Mets needed offense and stability from their rotation to avoid being swept. Scott has been steady rather than sensational this season; his ERA and peripheral numbers suggest he can eat innings but not necessarily silence a lineup that has shown moments of discipline and contact. Phillips, meanwhile, arrives in a new role — his first start after thriving in relief — with an unusually high walk total that creates a specific vulnerability the Mets could exploit, if they could get to him early without Soto in the order.
That set up the central tension of the afternoon. The stat lines present a contradiction. Phillips’ 1.20 ERA and 342 ERA+ over 30 relief innings indicate dominance, yet 16 walks in that span argue the dominance came at the price of control; a start stretches a pitcher differently than relief work. Scott’s 4.12 ERA and 11.4 K/9 show he can miss bats but has allowed enough contact and baserunners (1.475 WHIP) that a cold Mets offense would be hard-pressed to convert scoring chances. With New York having scored only four runs across three games, the absence of Soto magnified a lineup problem that had already been obvious for days.
The immediate question for the Mets on Sunday was operational: could Scott keep the game close long enough for a lineup missing its star to scratch out runs against a reliever-turned-starter who has dominated but often flirted with free passes? If Phillips’ walk rate persisted or climbed in a starting role, it would hand the Mets one clear path back into the game; if it didn’t, the Marlins’ gamble to start him would look prescient.
The more consequential short-term development to watch is Polanco’s rehab timetable. Mendoza’s view that Polanco could be ready "pretty soon" is the club’s most tangible piece of good news; with Soto sidelined by illness and the offense sputtering, a healthy Polanco would be the most realistic remedy to the lineup’s immediate shortage of production. For now, though, the Mets’ fate in Miami on Sunday hinged on Scott containing the opposition and on whether Phillips’ move to the rotation would expose or erase the walk trouble that has been his lone glaring mark.
