Pick your reason why the Mets lost this game. 

The first and obvious one was Rafael Montero. Montero’s final line was 1.2 innings, five hits, six runs, six earned, four walks, and two strikeouts. He probably wasn’t even that good either. 

The sequence that perfectly sums up the night Montero had, as well as his Mets career, was his walking Bryce Harper and Wilson Ramos with the bases loaded in the first inning. 

Remarkably, Collins saw those 37 pitches and thought, “I want to see more of that!” Actually, you know what, it wasn’t all that surprising. Collins passed over a chance to hit for him in the second inning so he could get two more outs out of Montero before going to a rested Gabriel Ynoa or Sean Gilmartin. They’d eventually come into the game along with the other long man Logan Verrett. 

For what it’s worth, Ynoa was roughed up as well pitching two innings allowing three hits, two runs, two earned, and two walks with one strikeout. 

If Jacob deGrom or Steven Matz cannot come back quickly, the Mets are in trouble because they cannot keep doing this three more times this season. They probably can’t afford to do this even one more time. 

Through Montero’s horrendous outing, you lose just how bad the Mets offense was.  It’s quite easy to forget the Mets had a 1-0 lead with Yoenis Cespedes hitting an RBI groundout to score Jose Reyes, who had led off the game with a double. After that, the Mets did nothing against Mat Latos and the Nationals bullpen. 

In fact, with Latos homering off Montero to lead off the second, he allowed as many runs as he knocked in. The only reason he didn’t get the win is he left the game early due to injury. 

The Mets didn’t deserve to win this one, and they didn’t look like a team that was fighting for a Wild Card. To rub salt in the wound, Daniel Murphy was 3-5 with a double. Meanwhile, Neil Walker is done for the season with back surgery, and no one knows when Wilmer Flores can play again. 

At least Kyle Hendricks took care of business against the Cardinals to keep the Mets a half game ahead of them in the Wild Card race.