It's gone from bad to worse for the Mets after their latest loss on Friday night.
Now having lost 14 of its last 16 games, with each loss more disappointing than the last, New York has hit a crossroads — one that requires the players to look themselves in the mirror and decide how they want to finish the season.
For how discouraging the Mets' recent play has been, it's been equally puzzling. After all, this is a team that is littered with talent, has a $339 million payroll and just went all-in at the trade deadline to push them over the top.
What's even more concerning is the losing lately is not for a lack of effort. Talk to anybody on the team and they'll say everybody is putting in the work and doing the right thing. In fact, it was stressed by nearly every player who spoke after the game, as well as manager Carlos Mendoza.
"At the end of the day, everyone is doing what they’re supposed to do, it’s just the other teams are outplaying us," said Francisco Lindor. "We are all trying to win ballgames and all I can think of right now is that we’re not clicking at the same time and the other team is outplaying us."
How could that be? How is it possible that a team so talented that's putting in the work on a daily basis is getting consistently outplayed, oftentimes by inferior competition?
"It’s tough. We’ve all asked that question and it’s tough to point at one thing," Lindor said.
Consider this, over their last seven games the Mets have blown leads of six runs, five runs, four runs, two runs (twice) and one run (seven times). They are 1-6 during that stretch.
"I know baseball is weird sometimes and stuff just happens," said Sean Manaea. "At the end of the day, no one’s gonna feel sorry for us so we just gotta figure it out. This is not where we wanna be and I know we’re way better than this."
After Friday's loss, New York is now only six games above .500, six games back of the Philadelphia Phillies for the NL East title and just 0.5 game up on the Cincinnati Reds for the third and final Wild Card spot.
It's been quite the fall from grace and if the Mets want to keep playing baseball in October this season, things need to change in a hurry with just 40 games left in the regular season.
"It’s part of the mountain," Lindor said. "You got to climb the mountain and right now we’re in a very steep part of it. And if we don’t get ourselves together and we don’t push ourselves to be better day in and day out, the mountain is gonna be tough to climb.
"It doesn’t feel good to lose, but we’re staying together and having the conversations. At the end of the day, we spend a lot more time here than we do in our houses so this is when teams come together and good teams, they turn it around and they go far."
New York still has time to figure things out and because the team played so well earlier in the season, it's allowed them to remain in playoff position despite such a horrendous run.
However, it's no longer just a bad stretch. The sample size is large enough to be concerning.
And if the players that the Mets traded for continue to fail them, talent alone won't be enough to carry them over the finish line.
"As much as this sucks, I feel like guys have been in the league long enough," Manaea said. "It’s part of the game, you grow from it, you learn from it, but at the same time nothing is given to us. We control our own destiny. It’s not gonna come easy, but we just gotta figure it out."
"We’re still in a place where we can continue to climb and put ourselves in a much better position," Lindor added. "It’s been tough to point at that one thing. At the end of the day it just comes down to execution."
Meanwhile, Brooks Raley offered a glimmer of hope and is excited to see this season through.
"When [we] come out of this, I mean I know our hair’s gonna be on fire and we’re gonna be ready to go," he said. "We’ll be fired up to win some games in a row and kind of streak some things together… We’ve got lots of baseball left and when it turns I know it’s gonna be a lot of fun."
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