MLB

Pirates’ Burnett thrives after escape from Yankees

The NL strikeout leader was at Citi Field last night and his name was not Matt Harvey.

A.J. Burnett — 16-10 with a 3.51 ERA last year with Pittsburgh — is 3-3 with a 2.57 ERA and 62 strikeouts this season, when the Yankees are paying $8.5 million of his $16 million salary.

The consensus is that he is beneficiary of a change of scenery, mainly in leaving the stress of the Yankees and the AL East. One NL personnel man echoed the theme of three executives asked about Burnett by saying the righty “is better and the reason isn’t stuff — it’s environment. Burnett is a classic small-market guy; the less the games matter the better he pitches. It’s not unlike Kenny Rogers or others who have struggled when they went to bigger markets to play where every game mattered. It’s easy to pitch in Pittsburgh because all you have to do is finish .500 whereas with the Yankees it’s a relentless pursuit of the next World Series title.”

Pirates manager Clint Hurdle actually said big responsibility is central to Burnett’s Pirates success, explaining, “he was just another guy in New York. He is not another guy in our clubhouse. He is our guy. … He has met the challenge and been up to it. He has been absolutely awesome.”

Russell Martin, who has caught Burnett in both locales, said, “being The Guy has helped him. He is just being free out there, just being himself. He is not adding pressure on himself.”

* The Mets actually will miss Burnett in a four-game series against Pittsburgh. But they are scheduled to face three straight lefties, beginning with Jeff Locke last night followed by Wandy Rodriguez and Francisco Liriano.

Terry Collins countered by benching both Lucas Duda and Ike Davis, and using Andrew Brown and Juan Lagares in the outfield and Justin Turner at first. It will be interesting to see if he continues that throughout this series.

But what is becoming the bigger long-term issue to watch is if the Mets feel they can have both Duda and Davis on the roster. It is one thing if Duda is hitting enough to forgive his defensive deficiencies in left. But if both Davis and Duda are going to struggle in the clutch and against lefties (especially Davis), wouldn’t the Mets be better off picking one or the other to play first and potentially using the other as a piece of a trade?