The Mets had a game they could live with for most of the night. Then the Dodgers kept stacking little wins, one after another, and the opener slipped away in a 4-2 loss that also came with another concern: Juan Soto left early because of continued soreness in his calf.
Sean Manaea gave the Mets exactly the kind of start they needed. He worked around a leadoff Shohei Ohtani single in the first, then settled in and kept the Dodgers from breaking through for much of the night.
The Mets even struck first in the second, when Luis Robert launched a towering solo homer to left for his second long ball in four games since coming off the injured list. Jared Young doubled later in the inning, but New York couldn’t cash him in.
Manaea kept escaping trouble until the fourth, when the Dodgers finally tied it. Freddie Freeman opened with a single and Mookie Betts followed with another, setting up Miguel Rojas to drive in Freeman on a fly ball.
Manaea then walked Kyle Tucker, but got the next two hitters to fly out and limited the damage to one run. He leaned heavily on fastballs and still navigated through a dangerous lineup with real efficiency.
Roki Sasaki was just as sharp on the other side. His splitter gave the Mets fits all night, producing a pile of whiffs and helping him strike out nine over seven innings. The Mets had a couple of chances to build on their early lead, but Sasaki kept slamming the door.
One of the game’s biggest swings came in the fifth, when Ohtani showed off the kind of bat control only he seems to have. He reached out and poked a Manaea sweeper that was well off the plate into right field for a double, then tried to turn it into a triple.
Carson Benge and Francisco Lindor teamed up to throw him out at third, a huge play that helped Manaea escape the inning. New York nearly answered right back when Jared Young singled, stole second and moved to third on a Sasaki wild pitch, but the Mets still couldn’t break the tie.
The sixth turned into another missed chance for the Mets and a major defensive moment for Benge. Freeman doubled to start the inning, then moved to third on a Mookie Betts fly ball.
Rojas lifted a ball deep enough to right for what went in the book as his second sacrifice fly of the night, but Benge fired a 100mph throw to the plate - the fastest by any Mets outfielder in the Statcast era - to nail Freeman and keep the go-ahead run from scoring. Manaea reacted with both arms raised in salute.
Any momentum from that play disappeared quickly when Soto’s night ended before his next turn at bat. Jorge Polanco pinch-hit for him to start the bottom of the sixth, a clear sign Soto was out because of the calf soreness that had already been bothering him. The Mets went quietly in that inning, and Manaea finished with one run allowed over six strong frames.
Brooks Raley took over in the seventh, and the Dodgers immediately started piling on again. Kyle Tucker beat out an infield single, Teoscar Hernández followed with a soft single, and Dalton Rushing’s squeeze attempt turned into a mess that still moved the runners into scoring position. Ohtani then lifted a sacrifice fly to give Los Angeles the lead, and after Raley walked Andy Pages, Tommy Edman grounded out to end the inning.
The Mets were retired in order in the seventh by Sasaki, who matched his career-long outing. Then the bullpen work that had been looming all night came into focus.
A.J. Minter allowed a leadoff single to Freeman in the eighth - the seventh Dodgers leadoff hit in eight innings - and Freeman even stole second.
Minter got two popups, but Kyle Tucker ended the inning with a two-run homer that pushed the Dodgers ahead 4-1.
Francisco Alvarez answered in the eighth with a solo homer off Evan Phillips to trim the margin to two. But that was as close as the Mets got. Cionel Pérez threw the only scoreless inning by a Mets reliever in the ninth, and Tanner Scott finished off a 1-2-3 bottom of the inning to seal it for Los Angeles.
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