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The St. Louis Cardinals return home Friday to face the New York Mets after settling for a split in a brief four-game road trip to Cincinnati.

Right hander Sonny Gray (3-0, 3.60 ERA) will get the start for the Cardinals, who have won four of their last seven games. He’s expected to face righty Clay Holmes (3-1, 2.64).

Now, St. Louis must get ready to face the leaders of the National League East. At 21-11, the Mets have the second-best record in the majors, a half-game back of the Los Angeles Dodgers.

New York comes to the Midwest having lost the final two contests of a three-game home series against the Arizona Diamondbacks, capping that with a 4-2 loss on Thursday. Juan Soto accounted for all of the team’s offense with a pair of solo home runs. The Mets’ $765 million signing over the winter now has five homers on the season.

Thursday’s blasts were his first since April 15 at Minnesota. In between those games, the star outfielder went 12-for-52 for a .231 average. With just three doubles among his hits, Soto, whose career slugging percentage is .529, slugged .288 in that 14-game stretch.

Mets manager Carlos Mendoza told reporters after Thursday’s loss that Soto had been hitting the ball hard during his recent skid, but on Thursday, he was finally able to get balls in the air.

“When he’s going in that direction, left center, he’s a pretty dangerous hitter,” Mendoza said. “It was good to see that today.”

The Cardinals had a chance to get a series win against the Reds. However, they mustered just three hits and a walk in a 9-1 loss. That came after the team racked up 15 runs in taking both ends of a doubleheader on Wednesday.

Still, getting a split against an NL Central rival on the road was a good sign for the Cardinals, as Brendan Donovan told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, especially for a team that had won just two of its first 14 games away from Busch Stadium.

“An area that we wanted to improve on was playing on the road,” he said. “We came into here, and (the Reds) were playing good baseball. It’s cool to see a doubleheader sweep. That one got away from us today.”

Coming back to St. Louis should help the Cardinals, as the team hits .289 at home.

Gray last registered a win on April 14 against the Houston Astros.

He pitched versus the Mets on April 20 in Queens, yielding three runs in six innings while getting a no-decision in a 7-4 loss. He gave up six hits and a walk and struck out six.

In his last start, at home against the Milwaukee Brewers last Saturday, Gray gave up seven hits and three walks – both season highs – over six innings and managed just four strikeouts. However, he only allowed three runs as the Cardinals won 6-5.

Holmes has earned wins in three of his last four starts. Over his last three appearances, he’s allowed just two earned runs, eight hits and four walks over 16 innings, while striking out 16.

He also got a no-decision in the April 20 game against the Cardinals, whom he limited to just a run on four hits and two walks with six strikeouts over six innings. That was Holmes’ only career start against the Cardinals. For his career, he is 0-2 with a 6.16 ERA in 12 appearances (one start) against St. Louis.

Gray is 4-0 with a 2.76 ERA in five starts against the Mets.

–Field Level Media