Hackers aim for second consecutive win against hesitant Mets

NEW YORK – A reshuffle of alignment has produced the desired results Monday night for the Pittsburgh Pirates. Unfortunately for the New York Mets, rookie manager Mickey Callaway has already been unsuccessfully out of his bag of tricks.

The Pirates will try to win a series of victories on Tuesday against the Mets who fall Tuesday night, as both teams play in the midst of a three-game set at Citi Field.

The right-handed Pirates, Chad Kuhl (5-5, 4.56 ERA), should oppose the left-footed Steven Matz (3-5, 3.68).

The Pirates ended a five-game losing streak on Monday night, when a reorganized Alignment Summit scored five points in a 6-4 win.

The top three Pirates hitters – Starling Marte, Josh Bell and Josh Harrison – were all in this position for the first time this season. Marte scored three points and stole two goals, Bell hit a two-run homerun and Harrison delivered a sacrificial fly and scored a point.

The six points have been most marked by the Pirates (37-41) since their 8-6 loss to the Cincinnati Reds on June 17. Pittsburgh has scored nine points in the last six games.

"If it's broken, you have to fix it, is not it?" Bell said Monday night. "Change things, give us all a new vision, Marte has not started in a while.J-Hey is hitting third, by changing things, it could have been the spark of which we needed.

The Mets (31-45) looked for a spark for weeks. New York lost seven in a row, 18 of 22 and 20 of 64 from an early 11-1 to dangerously fall near the bottom of the National League. The Miami Marlins are the only team to have a bad result on the senior circuit.

Reassembling the lineup did not work for Callaway, who had three players (Jose Bautista, second-place drummer, Dominic Smith, clean-up drummer and Jose Reyes, sixth), in unknown places on Monday. Smith was at the cleaning bat for the first time this year while Bautista and Reyes occupied their places for the second and third time, respectively.

Against the New York Yankees on June 9, Callaway beat Amed Rosario for the first time as a major player and Todd Frazier and Brandon Nimmo respectively second and third, for the first time this season in a 4-3 loss.

Since the Mets do not see immediate interest in Callaway's mix and partnership, he hopes the lessons learned from the grim prolongations will yield results on the road.

"As difficult as it has been, we have to understand that it's something we can benefit in the long run," Callaway said Monday afternoon. "No matter how many times you fall, you can learn from it and I think our guys understand it and we talk about that stuff all the time."

Kuhl and Matz are both looking to rebound after gross losses last Thursday.

Kuhl allowed eight runs in two innings while the Pirates fell to the Arizona Diamondbacks, 9-3. The eight races were the second-most-allowed Kuhls as a top scorer as both laps started his second shortest start.

Matz allowed five points in five innings and two-thirds in the Mets' loss to the Colorado Rockies. The five earned runs were a high season for Matz, who allowed three runs or fewer in his previous seven starts.

Kuhl took the defeat in his only previous start against the Mets on May 26, 2017, when he dropped five points on 4 1/3 innings as the Pirates lost, 8-1.

Matz also lost his only start against the Pirates on June 7, 2016, when he allowed two points in five innings in the 3-1 defeat of the Mets.