By CHUCK KING
Associated Press
JUPITER, Fla. (AP) — Matt Harvey cruised through four scoreless innings, and the New York Mets pounded Miami pitching in an 11-0 victory that spoiled Giancarlo Stanton’s return to the Marlins’ lineup Sunday.
Making his second start of the spring, Harvey felt encouraged that he handled the NL East-rival Marlins, a team that’s traditionally given him trouble.
"In the past my track record against Miami hasn’t really been that great," said Harvey, who is 2-2 with a 3.48 ERA over the past three years against the Marlins. "It’s nice to finally figure them out a little bit."
Harvey allowed one hit and walked two while striking out four, with one of those strikeouts coming on a slider — a pitch he didn’t use much early last year as he returned from Tommy John surgery.
"I was throwing it pretty well today and used all my pitches pretty effectively, so it was a good day," Harvey said.
The right-hander issued one of his walks to Stanton, who was making his first Grapefruit League appearance in more than a week after experiencing knee soreness.
The Marlins originally listed the slugger as their designated hitter, but elected shortly before the first pitch to start him in right field.
"Why not?" Stanton said. "Just sitting and DH is not a good gauge for a situation like that."
Stanton walked leading off the second inning and was thrown out trying to steal second. His second time up, Stanton tapped a check-swing roller a few feet in front of the plate.
The Mets also challenged him in the field. Stanton glided toward the line to easily corral Alejandro De Aza’s fly ball to end the second inning.
He couldn’t quite cut off Ruben Tejada’s RBI triple to right-center in the fourth, allowing the ball to go all the way to the wall. In the fifth, chasing a fly ball by De Aza that got over his head, Stanton slid to the ground on the warning track before popping up to retrieve the ball.
One batter later, Stanton tracked down Juan Lagares’ fly at the right-center warning track. He exited after the fifth inning.
"I felt relatively good," Stanton said.
Tejada gave the Mets an early lead with a two-out, two-run double into the left-field corner in the second. Tejada came around to score one batter later on second baseman Dee Gordon’s throwing error.
Yoenis Cespedes drove in his fourth run of the spring with a fifth-inning single up the middle that scored De Aza
Copyright 2016 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.