For eight innings, the Mets pitched, hit and fielded smoothly.
Innings nine and 10 were chaotic, darkly comedic and ultimately costly.
Edwin Diaz blew his second save of the season and the Mets played a very poor 10th inning in a 5-4 series-opening and stomach-turning loss to the Phillies in front of 28,086 at Citi Field on Monday night.
The Mets (19-21) have lost three of the first four in this perhaps telling seven-game stretch against the Braves and Phillies, the latest particularly painful.
The Mets entered the ninth up by two and handed the ball to Diaz, who allowed a homer to Bryson Stott.
The closer then served up a single to Kody Clemens and walked Brandon Marsh to get further in trouble.
He bounced back, striking out Kyle Schwarber and inducing a pop-out from Stubbs.
But Diaz lost Whit Merrifield on a walk — on a pitch that Merrfieild had appeared to swing at, but it was ruled he had checked his swing — before Diaz hit Alec Bohm in the hand, inches from the knob of the bat, to tie the game.
Sean Reid-Foley entered a tied game in the 10th and threw a pitch between Tomas Nido’s legs to advance ghost runner Bryce Harper to third. Nick Castellanos then took ball four and walked to first — but the Mets argued it was ball three, only for a review to find it was indeed ball four.
Stott plated what became the game-winning run on a sacrifice fly because the Mets’ offense stalled in the 10th.
Joey Wendle, who has struggled all year, pinch hit for Tyrone Taylor and popped up a bunt for an out against Jose Alvarado.
Harrison Bader grounded out and Jeff McNeil flared out, stranding the ghost runner in a frustrating finish.
Forgotten by the end was Sean Manaea’s excellence. He allowed just one run in six innings on four hits and a walk with six strikeouts.
The only run he surrendered came in the second inning when Garrett Stubbs’ two-out drag bunt got the Phillies on the board.
Three of the four hits Manaea allowed were soft, with an infield single and a bloop hit from Harper in the mix.
After a poor outing in a loss to the Royals on April 13, Manaea has allowed seven earned runs in five starts and 26 ²/₃ innings, lowering his season ERA to 3.05.
He got help from Bader, whose sliding catch to retire Johan Rojas in the fourth saved a run, and got more help from the arms behind him until Diaz came undone.
The Mets’ offense did not do a ton but did some damage, largely because of its righty sluggers.
Pete Alonso and J.D. Martinez reached on a combined seven of 10 plate appearances.
In the second inning, the two hit back-to-back doubles to plate one run, and Tomas Nido’s single scored another to give the Mets a lead.
The Mets scored again in the third when they loaded the bases on a Starling Marte double, Francisco Lindor walk and Alonso single.
They only plated one, though, on a bases-loaded walk from Martinez.
Philadelphia’s Christopher Sanchez struck out Brett Baty, Bader and McNeil in succession to escape further damage.