Sloppy Mets fall short against Cubs for sixth straight loss as season continues downward spiral

Just when it seemed like the Mets might quiet the noise — around their manager, around their president of baseball operations, around everyone in the clubhouse associated with this dismal season spiraling toward the trade deadline — for one night, they still found a way to lose. Just when the offense was actually able to fix the latest mess that the defense made to give them a chance in extras, it still wasn’t enough.

This time, less than 24 hours after the Mets and Cubs made a trade in what might be a summer full of them, the centerpiece of the two clubs’ last major deal issued a reminder of why it aged so poorly for his former team. Pete Crow-Armstrong — the former Mets prospect sent to Chicago in the 2021 Javier Báez deal — doubled home the winning run for the Cubs in the 10th off Brooks Raley. Eric Wagaman, Brett Baty and Carson Benge couldn’t find a way to get Ronny Mauricio home in the bottom of the frame. And it sent the Mets to a 4-3 loss as their losing streak extended to six and they inched closer to the seemingly inevitable decision to sell at the deadline.

That’s the reality,” Carlos Mendoza said when asked about that after the season hit its official midway point one night after David Peterson was traded to Chicago. “Especially if we don’t start playing better. Obviously, we gotta be honest here. But we can’t be thinking about what-if. Our job is to do what we need to do now.”

This time, the Mets (34-47) found a way to punch back after a pair of errors by Mauricio — or, if the fans at Citi Field had any say in the official scoring, Mark Vientos — and Benge gave the Cubs a three-run lead. Wagaman first stepped into a fastball on the first pitch from Ethan Roberts and sent it over the left field fence and then, Jared Young sent a curveball from ex-Met Phil Maton over the right field fence.

But until that point, Thursday had started to unfold as the worst type of encore for the Mets one night after they committed six errors in a game. Mauricio one-hopped a throw that Vientos couldn’t scoop, leading to one Cubs run. After Mauricio’s error, fans at Citi Field brought back the “Pete Alonso” chants from Wednesday. They blamed Vientos for allowing Dansby Swanson to reach base more than Mauricio, who was starting at shortstop and playing in his first game since May 2. Swanson then advanced to second on a groundout and came around to score when ex-Met Michael Conforto lined a single to right field.

One out later, the Mets defense cratered again. Alex Bregman lined a ball up the right field line, but Benge couldn’t time the bounce off the wall. Conforto scored on the play. Bregman ended up on third, making it easy to score when Ian Happ singled. When it all added up at the end of the frame, Freddy Peralta — cruising to that point — had allowed three unearned runs.

“It’s just routine plays that are just costing us,” Mendoza said. “At this level, you expect to make plays like that. Those are routine plays. You understand that they’re not gonna be perfect, but those are routine as it gets.”

The Mets had their chances, though. They loaded the bases in the third inning before Vientos fouled out. Had runners on first and second the next frame, too, with Mauricio’s double keying it all, before Baty grounded out. Loaded the bases again in the sixth after Wagaman’s blast, with Juan Soto grounding out, too.

Peralta recovered from his 10-run outing to cruise through five innings before the defense ruined his final two-thirds of a frame. He struck out five batters, walked another one and allowed five hits in an outing that, if nothing else, could boost the pending free agent’s trade value when the end of July arrives.

“Everybody in here’s frustrated,” Wagaman said. “I think we know what our record is. … We can’t get all those wins back in one day. We just have to start stacking them and take it day by day.”

But then Crow-Armstrong delivered some more misery for his former team. And as the Peterson trade showed, the Mets could be rapidly running out of time with the current group.