Marlins 3
Mets 0
MIAMI – Good thing the Mets and Marlins moved up today’s game from 3 p.m. to 1 pm.
No sense in delaying the inevitable.
The Mets have lost 11 straight games, while the Marlins have won nine straight and 10 in a row against the Mets. Hey, if you’re a Met fan, at least an earlier start today won’t kill your whole afternoon.
There isn’t much news with the Mets right now, not when it comes to on-field play. The only thing that really changes is the number when you write the phrase “have now lost [number] in a row.” Right now, the digit’s at 11.
The latest defeat was a 3-0 spanking by the Marlins, making it 16 losses in the Mets’ last 17 games. Same formula as it’s been – no hitting, bad fielding. Caught the energy yet?
The Mets are winless in September (0-7) and winless since Art Howe’s veterans-only meeting last Saturday (0-4), which has inspired nothing other than four straight beatings by a combined score of 21-5. The misery is almost staggering – the Mets haven’t held a lead in 58 innings.
Fifty-eight innings!
Still, you might want to stay tuned since the Mets are now only three straight defeats away from tying the Diamondbacks for the season’s longest losing streak. According to the Elias Sports Bureau, Arizona lost 14 straight from July 9-25.
Meanwhile, at 60-78, the Mets are only one game ahead of the cellar-dwelling Expos, who beat the Cubs last night. And you thought there wouldn’t be any September excitement.
“It’s just a team-wide slump,” Howe said before the game. “You lose 10 in a row; it’s a complete team effort. Offense one time, defense one time, pitching another time . . . When you’re no longer in it, maybe subconsciously it takes something away from players. I don’t know.”
What we do know is the offense is in the worst state right now. Incredibly, for the third straight game, the Mets were held hitless through the first three innings. This time, Josh Beckett turned the trick into the fifth until Mike Piazza led off with a double. Three batters later, he was stranded when Jason Phillips bounced into an inning-ending double play.
In the sixth, the clutch futility was even uglier. With runners on second and third and nobody out, Eric Valent struck out, Wilson Delgado struck out and Cliff Floyd grounded out.
The Mets would finish with just four hits, and since Howe’s meeting, they’ve tallied five runs and 13 hits in four games. They’ve looked listless, lethargic and anything else synonymous, which doesn’t speak well for the manager’s inspirational abilities.
Jae Seo, meanwhile, pitched decently, allowing three runs (two earned) in five innings. But as it tends to be with the Mets, that didn’t really matter. In the third inning, Seo was betrayed by a bad error, and that was all the Marlins needed.
With runners on first and third and two outs, Seo was on the verge of escaping trouble. All he needed to do was retire Paul LoDuca, and he nearly did, getting the Florida catcher to hit a sharp grounder to shortstop. No problem, end of threat and end of inning, right?
Um, no. Instead, the ball scooted right through Delgado’s legs and into the outfield for a run-scoring error. One-zip, Florida.
Two innings later, LoDuca hammered a two-run blast into the left-field stands, and Seo slammed his hands on his legs in anger.
The last time the Mets lost 12 straight? That was during a terrible stretch from Aug. 10-23, 2002. Of course, the team’s all-time record for consecutive futility came when they dropped 17 straight in their inaugural 1962 season. Forty-two years later, here come the Mets.
