Mets Drop 4th Straight, Fall To .500 After Bullpen Implodes Against Giants

Following a late finish to their Sunday Night Baseball matchup with the Dodgers, the Mets landed in San Francisco in the early hours on Monday morning.

And later that evening, the Mets had a short-lived comeback that saw their bullpen give the lead back to the Giants, who ultimately captured a 7-5 victory in the series opener.

While the offense was able to score five runs, the bullpen gave up five runs, highlighted by Trevor May's rough seventh inning, which led to the Mets' fourth straight loss to drop to .500 for the first time since May 6 at 59-59.

They've now lost the first four games of their brutal 13-game stretch against the Dodgers and Giants, and are 12-19 since the All-Star break and 3.5 games back in the NL East.

"We just gotta go and play our game," said manager Luis Rojas about his team now being in danger of dropping below .500. "We can't do more than that. Just prepare like we normally prepare. We can't worry about anything we can't control or standings wise."

"Overall, I thought the guys swung the bats better than we have in the past four days so we need to carry it over," said Rojas. "We were better overall in the approach. We did miss a couple spots with runners in scoring position."

Mets third baseman J.D. Davis echoed what his manager said as well.

"We don't really think about our record," said Davis. "We are more into winning ball games. That's the biggest thing, trying to get back into things and get it to snowball on the winning side. But I'll give you this: it is absolutely important and I've always preached how important it is to win a series."

Starting pitcher Rich Hill, who arrived in San Francisco ahead of the team, retired the first five batters he faced with two strikeouts across three scoreless innings to begin his night.

But in the top of the fourth, the Giants' offense got to Hill, as Buster Posey drove a double into the gap in left center, before Darin Ruff knocked him in with an RBI single for the first run of the night.

Old friend Wilmer Flores recorded the Giants' fifth straight hit in the inning to extend the lead to 2-0 off Hill. The left-hander's day was done after just 3.2 innings in what was another disappointing outing since joining the Mets (5.10 ERA across four starts). Miguel Castro came on with two-outs to bail Hill out of the inning by inducing a line out.

After the Giants went up 2-0, the Mets answered back in the top of the fifth with three runs of their own against ace Kevin Gausman, who did not have his best stuff in this outing.

With runners on first-and-second and nobody out, Pete Alonso snapped the team's 0-for-28 hitless streak with runners in scoring position by sending a two-run triple into the gap in right center field to tie the game.

Not only was this Alonso's first triple of the season, but it was the Mets' first triple in 68 games.

But that's not all, Dom Smith came through with a go-ahead sacrifice-fly to give the Mets a 3-2 lead.

Unfortunately for the Mets, the Giants struck back again in the bottom of the fifth when Kris Bryant blasted a two-run shot to straight away center off Miguel Castro to put his team back ahead at 4-3.

And this was a lead the Giants would not relinquish as they jumped on Trevor May in the bottom of the seventh on back-to-back homers from Brandon Belt and Kris Bryant (second of the night), along with an RBI double to Brandon Crawford, which saw them go up 7-3.

"It's bitter sweet. We know what we are capable of and are confident," said Davis. "And we are right there, we are in these games and it's just that one hit that puts us over the top. We thought we got it today with Pete (Alonso)."

"We had some missed opportunities in this game. I thought we played a solid game, but we came up short."

With Gausman out of the game after five, the Mets got the first two runners on in the top of the sixth against the Giants' bullpen. However, the next three batters failed to reach base, which wasted a prime opportunity to tie things up.

In the top of the eighth, Jonathan Villar got the Mets closer with a two-run shot, cutting the deficit to 7-5. But this proved to not be enough.

Trailing by two-runs in the top of the ninth, Giants closer Jake McGee came on and slammed the door shut by setting the Mets down 1-2-3 to seal their fate.