At times last night it was hard to tell who was trying harder to get John Maine out of NLCS Game 2, the Cardinals or the Mets.

The Met theory with starting pitchers not named Glavine this October is go as long and hard as you can – or until the fourth inning, whichever comes first.

Willie Randolph has devised a plan to turn a marathon into a relay race, handing off the ball over and over again through the length of nine innings. It is a convention-defying game and a dangerous one at that – to try and get to The Canyon of Heroes one pitching change at a time.

The peril of expecting so many different relievers to pitch well so often was underscored as the Cardinals earned a dramatic 9-6 victory. Chad Bradford, Pedro Feliciano and Aaron Heilman performed exquisitely out of the pen. Guillermo Mota and Billy Wagner did not, allowing the Cardinals to tie the NLCS at a game apiece.

St. Louis overcame the two-homer might of Carlos Delgado and the awesome engine that is Jose Reyes to rob the Mets’ home-field edge. The Cardinals did something more important, however. They saw how they could steal this series. They saw first-hand that beyond Tom Glavine the Mets have no starters Randolph trusts. That is going to put an onerous load on the Met pen, and the longer the series goes the heavier the burden – and arms – will be for the Mets.

At this point, the Mets have played five playoff games. Glavine has started two and worked 13 innings. Maine and today’s starter, Steve Trachsel, have combined for 11 2/3 innings in the other three games. That has meant the pen had to endure 15 1/3 innings of work in those three games, and that is just too much. And the Mets have yet to unleash their most unreliable starter, Oliver Perez, who is scheduled for Game 4.

Maine is not proving much more reliable. He needed 88 pitches to finish four innings or one pitch fewer than Glavine expended the previous night in seven shutout innings. Bradford and Feliciano combined for two impeccable innings in Maine’s aftermath. However, Randolph has developed an infatuation with Guillermo Mota, who may go from September surprise to October demise.

Mota retired the first two batters of the seventh with the Mets nursing a 6-4 advantage before losing an 11-pitch duel with Albert Pujols, who singled. No shame in that. Pujols is a great hitter. But walking Jim Edmonds on four pitches, Mota’s follow-up act, was unpardonable.

Heilman was warming. In Game 1, Randolph had shunned his normal flow chart of using Heilman as his main set-up man to Wagner and, instead, had Mota pitch the eighth in relief of Glavine. Mota endured some jitters to do his job and the Mets won 2-0.

Here, again, Randolph ignored Heilman and standard practice. Rather than pitching coach Rick Peterson, it was Randolph who went to the mound to challenge Mota and to express his confidence by sticking with the righty. Mota got ahead 0-2 on Scott Spiezio, starting in place of the Cardinals’ injured, slumping third baseman Scott Rolen. Spiezio then connected with a 96 mph fastball that sent Shawn Green drifting quickly back. Green leaped, had the ball glance off the top of the fence and stay in the park for a game-tying, two-run triple.

Mota was removed at that point, having appeared in four of the Mets’ five playoff games, logging a bullpen-high 5 2/3 innings. He also has yielded a team-high five runs. Wagner came on in the ninth, his fifth appearance in five games.

So Taguchi homered leading off, and Wagner permitted hits to three of the next four batters, as well. Ultimately, he left to the boos of 56,349 angry fans at Shea, many of whom remember that Wagner’s October past is not distinguished. Many of whom also recognized that this was the Mets’ chance to put a stranglehold on this series, to win when the Cardinals started ace Chris Carpenter.

Instead, the Mets asked too much of their pen, and it finally leaked.