MIAMI — The Miami Marlins billed this weekend collection in opposition to the Mets as their World Sequence. It’s not fairly a World Sequence for the Mets, nevertheless it’s virtually as vital given the implications it carries.
They performed like they had been desirous to pop champagne bottles initially of the sport, with leadoff man Francisco Lindor homering on the second pitch he noticed from Sandy Alcantara. The Mets scored twice within the first inning to place the Fish on discover, however then a mix of unhealthy luck, unhealthy pitches and unhealthy fundamentals led to a six-run rally by the Marlins.
The Mets misplaced 6-2 on Friday night time at LoanDepot Park, and the Cincinnati Reds beat the Milwaukee Brewers to tie the Mets (82-78) for the third NL Wild Card spot. The Reds personal the tiebreaker, so the Mets should win a minimum of yet one more sport than Cincinnati this weekend to keep away from elimination.
“We’ve got to win the next two and see what happens,” mentioned supervisor Carlos Mendoza. “But we did it to ourselves.”
They did it to themselves with errors and miscues, or what Keith Hernandez likes to name “bad fundies.” They’ve piled up over the past month, however they’ve turn into particularly obtrusive and particularly detrimental in current weeks. Essentially the most irritating half is likely to be the shortage of solutions as to why established gamers proceed to fumble routine performs.
They discipline grounders every day and so they put in additional work earlier than video games — even the pitchers. They insist it’s not the strain attending to them. Mendoza shot down the notion that the Mets are making psychological errors because of a scarcity of focus.
“There’s always attention to details and there’s always a level of focus and everything,” Mendoza mentioned. “It’s just frustrating.”
The underside of the fifth was ugly. The Marlins (78-82) batted round, knocking right-hander Brandon Sproat out of the sport and increasing the inning in opposition to his alternative, left-hander Gregory Soto. Pete Alonso had two defensive miscues, Augustin Ramirez stole two bases and Connor Norby pinch-hit a three-run homer off Soto to cap the inning and put the Fish up by 4 runs.
The Mets left the sector to boos from their very own followers in a ballpark hundreds of miles from their very own.
Sproat gave up onerous contact proper from the beginning of the inning, however he might need had a greater probability of getting out of it if Alonso had made a play at first base on leadoff hitter Jakob Marsee, or if Soto had been in a position to throw out Ramirez at third, however the pitcher didn’t seem to note the runner going.
“As a left-handed pitcher, you’ve got that runner in front of you, and for [Ramirez] to take off like that, and for us not to be able to just either step off, or just not give them a free base there, it was kind of an inning changer,” Mendoza mentioned. “Clearly the only after they took third base once more, it’s a very completely different inning…
“We continue to make those mistakes, and it’s costing us.”
Sproat had given up solely a single hit by means of his first 4 innings, then the Marlins took three straight off of him to start out the fifth. Heriberto Hernandez tripled to proper with two on and none out, tying the sport at 2-2.
With one out, Marsee hit a dribbler to Alonso at first, however he dropped the ball. Second baseman Jeff McNeil was there to again him up and assist get the out, however had the error he might have tried to get Hernandez at residence.
“He was going on contact, so it was a tough one, but, I mean, I’m still happy I was able to get an out in that situation,” Alonso mentioned. “Not ideal. I mean, if I had fielded it cleanly, I would have threw it home, but I’m still happy we were able to at least get one out there in that spot. If you don’t get an out there at all, then things could, could have gotten way worse.”
It’s onerous to think about how a lot worse issues might have been for the Mets of their third-to-last sport of the season.
In his fourth huge league begin, Sproat (0-2) was charged with 4 earned runs on 5 hits, strolling two, hitting two batters and hanging out two over 4 2/3 innings.
“You’ve got to be present every single inning, and I was still present there, [but] they put a couple of hits together and it didn’t go my way,” Sproat mentioned. “I mean, that’s baseball. That’s the game.”
Alcantara (11-12) successfully quieted the Mets after the primary inning. He stranded runners within the second and third, retiring 10 straight at one level, and 15 of 16 from the third inning till the seventh when he issued a leadoff stroll to Lindor. After Miami took the lead, he wanted solely 14 pitches to get the subsequent six outs.
The 2023 NL Cy Younger Award winner held the Mets to solely six hits and two earned runs in his remaining begin of the 2025 season, strolling two and hanging out three in a seven-inning gem.
The Mets went 1-for-10 with runners in scoring place, leaving seven on base. They’re dangerously near being eradicated from postseason rivalry.
“Good thing it’s not over yet,” Alonso mentioned. “Hopefully we can win tomorrow and we won’t have to face that reality.”
Initially Printed: September 26, 2025 at 9:54 PM EDT
