Yankees vs. Mets: Fight for the city

After splitting the first two games of the series, the Yankees look to earn a series win against the crosstown rival Mets. Starting for the Yankees is Nathan Eovaldi, the fireballing righty whose effectiveness seems to be almost entirely dependent on whether his slider is working. In seven career starts against the Mets, he is 1-3 with a 4.62 ERA. But he is also coming off a solid start against the offensively loaded Tigers, where he held the likes of Yoenis Cespedes, Victor Martinez, and Miguel Cabrera to just one run over seven innings.

In addition to building on adjustments made to his delivery against Detroit, he will also need to make an extra effort to change hitters' eye levels throughout the game. This heatmap of his fastball usage in 2014 suggests that he really likes keeping his fastball around a hitter's waist level:

The Mets counter with Jon Niese, a lefty who likes to keep the ball on the ground. Niese won't light up any radar guns, but he will mix it up. Last season, he did not throw any of his pitches more than 28% of the time. In four starts against the Yankees, he has a 2.05 ERA. Unfortunately for Niese, the red-hot Mark Teixeira has a .375 lifetime batting average against him. There have already been three Tex Messages this series, so he is clearly locked in at the plate.

Be sure to tune in at 8 pm as the Yankees take on New York's other baseball team on ESPN!

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<h3>Today's Lineups</h3>

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<th align="left">NEW YORK METS</th>

<th align="left">NEW YORK YANKEES</th>

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<tr><td class="td-last td-name">Curtis Granderson - RF</td><td class="td-first td-name">Brett Gardner - LF</td></tr><tr><td class="td-last td-name">Juan Lagares - CF</td><td class="td-first td-name">Chris Young - CF</td></tr><tr><td class="td-last td-name">Lucas Duda - 1B</td><td class="td-first td-name">Alex Rodriguez - DH</td></tr><tr><td class="td-last td-name">Michael Cuddyer - LF</td><td class="td-first td-name">Mark Teixeira - 1B</td></tr><tr><td class="td-last td-name">Daniel Murphy - 2B</td><td class="td-first td-name">Carlos Beltran - RF</td></tr><tr><td class="td-last td-name">Eric Campbell - 3B</td><td class="td-first td-name">Chase Headley - 3B</td></tr><tr><td class="td-last td-name">Wilmer Flores - SS</td><td class="td-first td-name">John Ryan Murphy - C</td></tr><tr><td class="td-last td-name">Danny Muno - DH</td><td class="td-first td-name">Stephen Drew - SS</td></tr><tr><td class="td-last td-name">Kevin Plawecki - C</td><td class="td-first td-name">Gregorio Petit - 2B</td></tr><tr><td class="td-last td-name"></td><td class="td-first td-name"></td></tr><tr><td class="td-last td-name">Jon Niese - LHP</td><td class="td-first td-name">Nathan Eovaldi - RHP</td></tr></tbody>

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