Jorge CastilloMay 1, 2026, 07:00 AM ETCloseESPN baseball reporter. Covered the Washington Wizards from 2014 to 2016 and the Washington Nationals from 2016 to 2018 for The Washington Post before covering the Los Angeles Dodgers and MLB for the Los Angeles Times from 2018 to 2024.Follow on XMultiple Authors
Are the Red Sox, Mets or Phillies in the most trouble right now? (3:08)Buster Olney and Jorge Castillo examine the early struggles of teams such as the Red Sox and Mets. (3:08)
March 26: A frosty moment between Lindor and Soto goes viral
April 22 (Part 1): Soto returns, adds fuel to clubhouse concerns
April 22 (Part 2): Mets finally win … but lose Lindor
April 23 (Part 1): Vientos runs through a stop sign
Less than 24 hours after the New York Mets finally snapped a stunning 12-game losing streak, president of baseball operations David Stearns made a declaration.
“I still think we’re a good team,” Stearns said last Friday. “I recognize we had a stretch where we did not play good baseball and it cost us and cost us repeatedly. But I think we’re a good team and I think we’re going to show that.”
The sample size is growing too large to disregard, and history is not on their side. The Mets are the 139th team to experience a 12-game losing streak. None of the first 138 clubs reached the playoffs.
“I don’t think anybody anticipated something like this,” manager Carlos Mendoza said. “You know you’re going to get hit with injuries and you’re going to face adversity. But to have everything at the same time is crazy. But, hey, we got to keep going.”
Will May bring better results? As the calendar turns to a new month, here’s a look back at the lowest moments of the Mets’ miserable start.
Clubhouse dynamics, a topic of discussion last season and through the winter, take center stage again — before the season’s first pitch is thrown.
Soto strains his right calf while running the bases in San Francisco and exits in the first inning. Soto, known for his durability, ultimately lands on the injured list and misses 15 games.
Lindor continues an unusual spate of gaffes by not covering second base on what should be an inning-ending double play against the Athletics, allowing a run to score in an 11-6 loss.
It’s Lindor’s fifth notable mental mistake of the young season. Two days earlier, he was flat-footed attempting to turn a double play in the third inning, then was caught off third base on a ground ball to first baseman Nick Kurtz in the sixth with the Mets down by a run. On April 1, against the Cardinals, he lost track of the number of outs fielding what should’ve been a routine double play in the first inning, then was picked off first base while fiddling with his batting gloves in the sixth.
“Not sure,” Lindor says when asked if he can attribute the lapses to anything. “I feel like I’m locked in. I feel like I’m in the game. It just happens. Got to be better.”
Slow starts are not foreign to Lindor. Two years ago, he batted .195 with a .634 OPS through May 1. But the previous struggles were limited to offensive production. This is different.
It’s one of the best pitching duels you’ll see this season: McLean — one of the few Mets performing to expectations this season — opposite Yoshinobu Yamamoto at Dodger Stadium. And the rookie right-hander McLean goes toe-to-toe with the World Series hero, allowing one run on two hits with eight strikeouts over seven brilliant innings while Yamamoto yields one run across 7⅔ innings.
The Dodgers — after a walk, a sacrifice bunt and an intentional walk — seize the lead in the eighth inning on Kyle Tucker’s RBI single off reliever Brooks Raley. With three outs to extend the game, the Mets go down flailing in the ninth inning. Dodgers left-hander Alex Vesia strikes out the side — Jorge Polanco, Bo Bichette and Francisco Alvarez — on 10 pitches. Just one lands in the strike zone.
After the game, Steve Cohen, who wades into social media waters more than any other owner in baseball, attempts to spread some positivity to the distressed fanbase. Fans do not reciprocate.
The Mets invested $40 million over two years in Polanco to replace Alonso at first base, a position Polanco has barely played at the professional level. The transition has come with its hiccups. But that goes on the backburner when the 32-year-old Polanco begins experiencing discomfort in his left Achilles, limiting him to designated hitter duty after just two starts at first.
Ultimately, a bruised right wrist sends him to the injured list — the seventh time Polanco has landed there since 2022. Alonso has appeared on the injured list twice in his career and never played fewer than 152 games over a full season in his seven years with the Mets.
“I’d call it week-to-week at this point rather than day-to-day,” Stearns says nearly a week later. “Every day we get a little bit more information.”
The Mets have a prime opportunity to snap their losing streak at 10 games — still astonishing for a club with one of the highest payrolls ever, but a stretch that teams have overcome to reach the postseason. The bullpen, however, can’t lock it down.
The Mets lead the Chicago Cubs 1-0 going into the ninth inning when closer Devin Williams, after the leadoff hitter reaches on a ground ball through the left side against the shift, yields a game-tying double to Michael Conforto. An inning later, with the speedy Pete Crow-Armstrong at second base to begin the extra frame, Craig Kimbrel is summoned and opens his outing with a wild pitch, allowing Crow-Armstrong to advance.
But that run didn’t matter. It is perhaps Mendoza’s most glaring strategy blunder of the season — and the most scrutinized given his club’s freefall.
Soto’s lack of communication is not considered abnormal in the clubhouse — the team was on the road for most of his IL stint, and it’s not a problem for the players. Soto’s candor, however, makes for bad optics externally when every move and every quote is under the microscope.
Soto’s return coincides with the Mets finally ending their losing streak with a 3-2 victory over the Twins. Soto goes 1-for-3 with a walk as the team’s designated hitter. His two outs are a 104.3 mph lineout and a 104.2 mph flyout.
But the sigh of relief is muted by Lindor exiting the game with a left calf strain. The Mets immediately know it’s more serious than the calf strain that sidelined Soto. Lindor is placed on the injured list the next day for the first time since July 2021.
Lindor is instructed to use a walking boot for a week. He will be reevaluated in mid-May, three weeks after sustaining the injury. So far this season, the Mets have had Soto and Lindor, their two best players, in the lineup together for just seven full games.
“We can’t use it as an excuse,” Mendoza says. “It’s difficult to lose a player of that caliber. We saw what losing Juan Soto meant while he was out. It’s unfortunate that the day Soto returns, Lindor falls. We have good players, good major league players. They’re going to keep receiving opportunities. Nobody is going to feel bad for us. We can’t use this as an excuse. We have to continue.”
On the bright side, they’re giving young Mets fans a lesson in grit, at least according to one therapist with an Instagram account:
With the Mets leading the Twins 10-7 and three outs from a win, Williams is summoned from the bullpen for the save. At least that is Mendoza’s plan — until an unusual case of miscommunication creates confusion.
While Williams jogs in to start the ninth, Huascar Brazobán, who the previous inning had helped blow a four-run lead, takes the mound again, believing he had been told to stay in the game. The rulebook stipulates a pitcher must face at least one batter once he crosses the base line, so Brazobán retires a batter before Mendoza replaces him with Williams.
Williams runs into trouble for his fourth straight outing, giving up a run on three hits before finally sealing a win that shouldn’t have been nearly as close as it was.
New York’s momentum from winning two straight games over the Twins quickly evaporates with a feeble weekend showing. The Rockies, fresh off a 119-loss season, sweep them in three games, including a Sunday doubleheader. The Mets score four total runs in the series — and just one in Sunday’s 18 innings. They emerge having scored two or fewer runs in 14 of their first 28 games. The offense, simply, has fueled the catastrophic month.
Afterward, the Rockies’ social media team trolls the Mets with a photoshopped image of the Empire State Building lit up in purple.
The Mets and Philadelphia Phillies begin the week with the same 9-19 record, the worst in the majors. But the NL East rivals decide to handle the disappointment differently.
The Phillies fire manager Rob Thomson on Tuesday ahead of their series against the Giants. Thomson, who led the club to four playoff appearances in four seasons and a trip to the World Series in 2022, becomes the second manager dismissed this season after the Red Sox sacked Alex Cora and six of his coaches three days earlier.
Like the Red Sox and Phillies, the Mets are a large-market, high-payroll franchise in the Northeast scuffling through a shockingly dismal start. But they keep their manager going into their series against the Nationals.
Next up: A flight to Anaheim, where they will welcome May with a nine-game road trip and a 10-21 record.
“It’s not early anymore,” Mendoza says after Thursday’s loss. “So, yeah, it’s obviously frustrating for a lot of people in here.”
How did they get here? The Mets’ roster, thanks to injuries and underperformance, has holes everywhere, but the offense has been the foundation for their abysmal performance. They rank last or next-to-last in several major offensive categories, including runs scored, OPS and wRC+. The deficiency became so apparent so early that the Mets have already reached out to teams, searching for offensive help with a willingness to trade one of their starting pitchers not named Nolan McLean, Freddy Peralta or Clay Holmes, sources told ESPN.