New York Mets @ Florida Marlins
	Sun Life Stadium

Scouting Report:

METS: Because Johan Santana's shoulder injury will keep him sidelined until at least midseason, Mike Pelfrey will make his first career Opening Day start against the Marlins. In five career starts at Sun Life Stadium, Pelfrey is 0-2 with a 5.22 ERA.

MARLINS: A two-time All-Star, Johnson is regarded as one of the top righties in the game. In 2010, he led the NL with a 2.30 ERA, but he missed the final few weeks of the season due to back/shoulder ailments.

Scouting Report:

METS: After a breakout season in 2010, Niese will start second for the Mets in 2011. The assignment is well-deserved. Before fatigue overtook him down the stretch last season, Niese posted an 8-5 record with a 3.33 ERA in his first 23 starts.

MARLINS: Paced the Marlins in wins a year ago, and his 54 career victories are second in Florida history. He should challenge Dontrelle Willis' record (68) this year. The right-hander missed the final month of '10 due to a meniscus tear in his right knee.

Scouting Report:

METS: Perhaps no story in baseball last year was better than the emergence of Dickey, who finally stuck in the big leagues at the age of 35. Dickey inked a two-year extension and has been working on a new, slower version of his signature knuckleball.

MARLINS: The righty brings veteran leadership and a proven track record to a comparatively youthful rotation. A proven innings-eater, Vazquez had a down season with in '10, but he still was able to reach double-digits in wins for the 11th straight year.

Team Leaders

Mets Injury Report

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Marlins Injury Report

The Mets have announced their line-up for their first game of the 2011 season against the Flordia Marlins tomorrow:

1. Jose Reyes – SS
2. Willie Harris – LF
3. David Wright – 3B
4. Carlos Beltran – RF
5. Angel Pagan – CF
6. Ike Davis – 1B
7. Brad Emaus – 2B
8. Josh Thole – C
9. Mike Pelfrey – P

I had a few ideas of what the Opening Day line-up might look like, but none of them looked like this. I guess Terry Collins' thinking here is that Pagan has more extra base power than Harris, so he wants to put him in the middle of the order to drive more runs in. Not too sure if a agree with it, but I still like this line-up. 

The Mets team is going to be able to go up against any other team in the league and give them a hard time. The Mets by no means have a bad baseball team. They just have a lot of question marks. If everyone can stay healthy and they put up the number we're use to seeing, than this could be a playoff team. I just don't know if that is going to happen though. 

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Game 1: Detroit Tigers vs New York Yankees – 1:05 pm (ESPN) — Opening day in the Bronx features two aces who have a poor history of Opening Day starts with their respective ballclubs. In 2 Opening Day starts for New York, CC Sabathia has an ERA over 10.00 and Verlander hasn't been too impressive either. Verlander also struggles in April, with a 1-2 record ang a 5.29 ERA in April last season. 

Game 2: Milwaukee Brewers vs Cincinnati Reds – 2:10 pm — This game will not be televised on ESPN, obviously, but If you have MLB Network or any of those extra packages you can view this game. Reds' Edison Volquez will battle Yovani Gallardo of the Brewers in what appears to be a wild NL Central race. Since the Cardinals are without Adam Wainwright for the season it will be interesting to see if the Brewers and Reds battle it out atop the division. if you can, keep an eye on this game on MLB.com's Gameday. Fielder, Braun, Votto, Bruce. Definitely going to be a great matchup. 

Game 3: San Francisco Giants vs Los Angeles Dodgers – 8:00 pm (ESPN) — This matchup will feature 2 young pitchers — one of which many feel is a rising star in the MLB. Tim Lincecum of the Giants and Clayton Kershaw of the Los Angeles Dodgers headline a surely outstanding game. The Giants come off an unpredictable World Series title run last season and look to defend their title with young catcher Buster Posey the stud of the lineup. However, Andre Ethier & Matt Kemp of the Dodgers look to overcome financial uncertainty in LA and make a surprising run to top the World Series champions. Keep in mind the NL West was a very close race last season and the San Diego Padres were the team to beat for most of the season, much to our surprise. 

Much to everyone’s surprise, Carlos Beltran is not the projected Opening Day starter who won’t be in the Mets lineup Friday at Florida. That great honor goes to Jason Bay who should’ve been the Mets left fielder from day one.

I hate to see this happen to Bay because I think it’s important for him to get off to a good start this season considering how last season went and this is obviously not going to qualify as a good start. On the bright side, Bay’s DL stint will be retroactive to March 25th, the last time he appeared in a spring training contest. So Bay will be eligible to make his return from the DL on April 9th, a Saturday game against the Washington Nationals a day after the Mets play their first home game of the season.

So hopefully it won’t take him too long to get back into the groove of baseball activities. He did participate in almost all of spring training, so it shouldn’t be too big of a problem for him. I still look for Bay to have a bounce back season this year. He’s too good of a player to let the same thing happen to him again this year.

Considering the Mets past issues with injuries, this is not what you wanted to see right from the get go. With Sandy Alderson and his regime running the team, you hoped the team could get a fresh start, but the injury bug still seems to be lingering. If the Mets want to at least make this season interesting, they will need to shake this quick. I’ve always been of the opinion that this team has had the talent to compete on the field, they just never had the ability to stay healthy. I think that still applies this year. The Mets could easily run out a Top 3 NL offense if things break right. The problem is, will everything break right?