NEW YORK -- Not long after Jacob Young made two spectacular catches to rob the Mets, and after Francisco Lindor and Pete Alonso each committed defensive errors in the early innings of a crucial game, and after Cedric Mullins made a costly baserunning blunder, and after Sean Manaea allowed three runs, and after the Mets scored only two of their own against, statistically, the two worst pitchers in baseball, the team finally fell out of playoff position.
New York’s 3-2 loss to the Nationals at Citi Field on Sunday, combined with the Reds’ win over the Cubs, ensured that the Mets would enter the final week of the regular season on the outside of the National League playoff bubble. Although New York and Cincinnati (both 80-76) are technically knotted for the final Wild Card spot, the Reds hold a crucial head-to-head tiebreaker that would award them the berth if those clubs finish with the same record.
It has been an almost unfathomable fall for the Mets, who produced Major League Baseball’s best record (45-24) from Opening Day through June 12. Since that time, they have played 17 games under .500.
As a result, for the first time all season, they will wake up Monday no longer in full control of their postseason destiny.
“We put ourselves in this position, so we’ve got to find a way to get out of it,” Lindor said. “And that comes down to winning.”
“You’ve just got to win,” Alonso echoed. “It’s simple. Winning solves everything at this point. We’ve just got to do it.”
That will not happen unless the Mets rapidly improve. Sunday’s loss, the Mets’ 11th in their past 15 games, did not have a single root cause. Instead, New York committed a cavalcade of mistakes while also running into some rotten luck in its quest to stave off continued demolition.
In the third inning -- after Lindor committed a throwing error and Manaea allowed a two-run homer to Nasim Nuñez in the second -- the Mets began fighting back on a Luis Torrens double and a Mullins RBI single. But Mullins, thinking left fielder Daylen Lile had caught his ball, paused between first and second base before proceeding forward. When it became clear that Lile dropped the ball and was injured, umpires called time and ruled that Mullins needed to return to first, where he was promptly doubled off on a Lindor line drive.
While the rest of the game might not have been as mistake-laden for the Mets, it was hardly crisp. Their opponents were Jake Irvin and Mitchell Parker, who entered the afternoon with the two worst ERAs of MLB’s 53 qualified pitchers. After scratching out only two runs against Irvin, New York did nothing against Parker, who retired 11 of the 13 batters he faced.
Along the way, Young made a circus catch to steal a hit from Brett Baty in the fifth and another spectacular grab to rob Francisco Alvarez of a potential game-tying homer in the ninth.
“All these games mean everything,” Manaea said. “It’s do or die at this point. So we’ve got to figure it out.”
To a man, the Mets continue to offer optimism that they will, indeed, figure it out. Their players still point to the talent in the room as reason for their confidence.
But the situation has changed. The Mets have now put themselves in a spot where even if they win their remaining six games, they could miss the playoffs. Beyond that, they have hardly proven worthy of assurance; since June 13, they’ve produced a better record than only the Nationals, Twins and Rockies.
“It’s been happening right in front of our eyes, so yeah, I can definitely believe it,” outfielder Brandon Nimmo said. “We’re down to the last week of the season, and our playoff hopes are in front of us. We've got to play winning baseball and put it all together. But it’s come and gone during the season. We just need to pick ourselves back up and win some games down the stretch here.”
If they can’t, the Mets will be remembered for one of the longest, slowest collapses in franchise history.
The 2007 Mets remain the gold standard for September ineptitude. Blowing a seven-game lead with 17 to play remains one of the most statistically improbable downturns in Major League history. The players on that team are forever marked by what happened down the stretch.
The 2025 Mets are not that. Their collapse has been slower, steadier, easier to see coming. In June, it would have been unfathomable to think the best team in the Majors might miss the postseason. In July, a ripple of concern surfaced. That rift deepened in August. In September, a few more stitches burst.
Sunday, when the Mets lost control of their destiny, it ripped clean open. They have six games remaining against the Cubs and Marlins. The Reds are scheduled to play the Pirates and Brewers.
“Everybody here knows where we’re at and what’s ahead of us,” pitcher Clay Holmes said. “But as a player, I think there’s still the opportunity to make something special happen. … It’s still there. It’s just up to us to go out and see what we can do with it.”