Mets must prove they can handle pressure of wild-card chase after ugly loss to Brewers

One poor performance, even this late in the season during a close wild-card race, could be explained away as one of those nights. But not two.

After an ugly 8-4 loss in Milwaukee to the Brewers on Friday night, suddenly it’s hard not to think the Mets are playing tight, feeling the pressure of having so much on the line as the games dwindle down to a precious few.

In some ways the two rainouts this week appeared to be a break for the Mets, allowing them the chance to, perhaps, clinch a wild card spot somewhere other than Atlanta, the city of so many haunting failures, and the place where they looked flat Tuesday night.

Yet it might just be that the Brewers are their worst nightmare.

After all, they’re now 0-4 against them, going all the way back to that season-opening sweep at Citi Field. And while the Mets are certainly in a far better place as a team all these months later, not much had changed as far as the matchup.

That is, the Brewers are a pesky bunch of grinders with little star power who put the ball in play, steal bases, play good defense, and rely heavily on what has been one of the best bullpens in the majors this season.

They were all of that and more on Friday night, most notably stealing six bases without being caught to run their total on the season to 14-for-14 against the Mets.

As such Francisco Lindor told reporters after the game that “we were outplayed” Friday night, in all phases of the game.

Nope, they didn’t hit, especially in the clutch. They didn’t pitch, even with their ace on the mound. And they made mistakes defensively.

They also lost Francisco Alvarez to a back injury, when he left the game in the seventh inning after sliding into third base, and probably won’t know until Saturday whether he’ll be available.

Actually, Carlos Mendoza could well be tempted to play Luis Torrens even if Alvarez is ok. Torrens is much better at throwing out runners, and has to be better at blocking pitches than Alvarez, who was charged with a passed ball Friday night and couldn’t block two wild pitches either.

But as bad as it looked on Friday night, even stopping the running game is a secondary concern. Their turnaround this season has been fueled by outstanding starting pitching and a lineup that has been streaky at times but mostly deep and dangerous.

None of that has been in evidence in the two losses this week.

It was one thing for Luis Severino to have a so-so start in Atlanta on Tuesday night. It was quite another for Sean Manaea, who has legitimately pitched like an ace for two months, to suddenly come unglued in the first inning Friday and surrender a grand slam to Rhys Hoskins that changed the complexion of the game.

To be fair, Manaea appeared to get squeezed by home plate umpire Ramon De Jesus (who eventually ejected Mendoza) in that first inning, and was visibly frustrated by it. He had reason to think he caught the top of the zone with a two-strikeout fastball to Hoskins, but he didn’t get the call.

But it’s still on him that he finally grooved a 3-2 fastball that Hoskins took deep.

All the more so because, as SNY’s Jerry Blevins noted on the Mets’ postgame show, questioning Manaea’s pitch sequencing, the left-hander threw five straight fastballs to a hitter who has made a living crushing fastballs off lefties.

Beyond all that, however, Manaea just wasn’t the same guy who has been so dominant. He didn’t have his good fastball, the one that has been overmatching hitters since he adopted Chris Sale’s sidearm delivery back in July.

“The fastball didn’t have life at the top (of the strike zone),” Mendoza said afterward.

And Manaea told reporters that for some reason the fastball had more sink rather than the usual high ride. When asked why, Manaea shook his head and said, “I don’t know.”

It was that kind of night. The left-hander survived into the fourth but never really figured anything out, managing only one strikeout.

And so the burden fell to the Mets’ offense to mount a comeback, and it seemed very doable against Frankie Montas, a journeyman right-hander with a history of control problems and making too many mistake pitches.

Yet the only damage the Mets could do against him in four innings was a two-run home run by Mark Vientos. The Brewers’ bullpen did the rest, starting with three scoreless innings from another journeyman, Joe Ross.

Mets’ hitters, especially Pete Alonso, looked jumpy, chasing pitches all night, leading to a total of 11 strikeouts, seven combined from Vientos, Alonso and Brandon Nimmo.

Lindor, in his return to the field, looked ok at the plate, with two singles and a walk in five plate appearances, which should be cause for optimism. He did look stiff at shortstop and bounced a couple of throws on routine ground balls, admitting that bending over aggravates his back, so perhaps Mendoza should consider putting him at DH and playing Luisangel Acuna at short.

We’ll see. Jose Quintana gets the ball on Saturday and maybe he can be a stopper.

But more than that, the Mets need a spark. More to the point, they need to prove they can handle the pressure and not choke the way they did at the end of the 2022 season.

I wasn’t willing to say it looked all too familiar after one flat loss in Atlanta. But it sure does now.