MIAMI -- The New York Mets' stupefying 2025 season, a 162-game ride that launched with World Series aspirations, ended with a thud at 2:59 p.m. ET on Sunday, the final day of the regular season.
The Mets reported to LoanDepot Park needing to beat the Miami Marlins and needing the Milwaukee Brewers to beat the Cincinnati Reds to reach the postseason. But New York couldn't handle its business, losing 4-0 to fall short of playing October baseball. The Reds will open a three-game wild-card series in Los Angeles against the Dodgers on Tuesday. The Mets will go home wondering what happened.
Just three weeks ago, on Sept. 8, the Mets owned a four-game lead over the Reds with 19 games remaining. They had a 92.2% chance to reach the postseason, according to FanGraphs. Even this weekend, when their slide had been going for three months, optimism still existed. Day after day, disappointment after disappointment, the Mets repeated the same line: There was too much talent in that clubhouse not to be able to reverse course and play in October.
But the reality is the Mets were one of the worst teams in the majors for nearly two-thirds of the season. The Mets woke up on June 13 with the best record in baseball at 45-24. Their playoff odds were 96.2%. They were playing like a team with the second-highest player payroll in the majors should play. After that, they morphed into a bottom feeder, going 38-55 for the remainder of the season. Only four teams -- the Colorado Rockies, Washington Nationals, Minnesota Twins and Chicago White Sox -- were worse.
Those clubs' playoff hopes died months ago; FanGraphs calculated the Mets' chances at 33.4% entering Sunday. They were extinguished when Francisco Lindor hit into a double play to end the game. It was the third time since 2007 that the Mets had their playoff hopes dashed with a loss to the Marlins on the final day of the regular season.
And so a franchise with a $340 million payroll -- a team that went to the NLCS last season and then signed Juan Soto to the largest contract in North American sports history -- could not clear the bar of being one of the National League's six best clubs after 162 games. In the fifth year of Steve Cohen's ownership -- a span in which he declared upon buying the team that he expected to win a World Series -- the Mets won't even get a chance to play in October for a title.
Here are 10 moments that encapsulate the franchise's latest collapse.
June 12: Senga's season goes off the rails
Record: 45-24
Division: First place (5.5 games up)
Reds' record: 35-34 (10 games back)
Mets' playoff projection: 96.2%
Kodai Senga was one of the best pitchers in the majors for the season's first six weeks, with a 1.47 ERA through 13 starts. Then he exited his start June 12 with a hamstring injury he suffered covering first base, and that ace-level pitcher never surfaced again.
Though disappointing for the Mets, which boasted the best rotation ERA in baseball to date, the Grade 1 diagnosis was considered encouraging, and Senga returned a month later with three games remaining before the All-Star break. The Mets thought they were getting their ace back. Instead, Senga became a problem.
The right-hander posted a 5.90 ERA in 39⅔ innings across nine outings upon his reinstatement from the injured list. The sudden decline was baffling. Both Senga and the Mets insisted he was healthy. Eventually, with the Mets unable to absorb poor outings in a playoff race, Senga agreed to an option to Triple-A Syracuse to work on his mechanics. He didn't pitch for the Mets again.
The Mets said: "Healthwise, he's 100 percent fine. There's no issues with him. He's not favoring anything. We just haven't been able to help him, whether it's mechanicals or execution, whatever the case might be here. But we haven't gotten there yet. So this is where we're at. But physically he's fine." -- manager Carlos Mendoza, Sept. 19
June 13: The beginning of the spiral
Record: 45-25
Division: First place (4.5 games up)
Reds' record: 35-35 (10 games back)
Mets' playoff projection: 94.9%
In the moment, and for the ensuing several weeks, the Mets' 7-5 loss to the Rays on June 13 did not warrant any special attention. The Mets' bullpen imploded in a six-run sixth inning, but the team was still 20 games over .500 with the top record in the National League -- despite a slow start from Juan Soto. It was an annoying loss in a long season. Nothing seemed askew.
But the result proved to be the beginning of the Mets' downward spiral. The Rays beat the Mets the next two days and left New York with a three-game sweep, and that bullpen collapse proved an early signal of looming trouble. The weekend marked the start of a seven-game losing streak for the Mets, the first of three skids of at least seven losses this season. With that first swoon, their lead in the NL East evaporated.
June 29: Blown out and swept by the last-place Pirates
Record: 48-37
Division: Second place (1.5 games back)
Reds' record: 44-40 (3.5 games back)
Mets' playoff projection: 78.1%
The Pirates hosted the Mets in late June already 18 games under .500, nearly two months removed from Pittsburgh manager Derek Shelton's firing. Very little was going right outside of Paul Skenes' performances every fifth day. And yet, Pittsburgh pounded the Mets in a three-game weekend sweep.
The Pirates, one of the worst offenses in baseball to that point, scored at least nine runs in each game and outscored the hosts 30-4. They held New York to the four runs without Skenes throwing a pitch. Frustration boiled to the point that the Mets held a players-only meeting after Saturday's 9-2 loss. No matter. The Pirates routed them 12-1 on Sunday to punctuate the series and hand the Mets their 13th loss in 16 games.
The Mets said: "We're going to stick together and continue to play as hard as we can, to come out of it and hopefully, once we are out of it, we don't go back to something like this." -- shortstop Francisco Lindor (MLB.com)
July 18: Costly loss to Cincinnati to open second half
Record: 55-43
Division: Second place (0.5 games back)
Reds' record: 51-47 (four games back)
Mets' playoff projection: 83.5%
The Mets' first game out of the All-Star break, a home date against the Reds, offered an opportunity for a restart just a half-game behind Philadelphia for first place. The optimism did not last.
Sean Manaea was effective in his first start after missing 3½ months with oblique and elbow injuries before coming out of the bullpen in his season debut. But his leash was short as he eased into a starter's workload, prompting Mendoza to pull him after 69 pitches over four innings with a 2-1 lead. The aftermath essentially cost the team a playoff spot.
Alex Carrillo, a 28-year-old right-hander who had made his major league debut earlier in the month, squandered the lead by surrendering two runs in the fifth frame. He was eventually charged with five runs on three hits over 1⅓ innings and never pitched for the Mets again. Journeyman left-hander Brandon Waddell, summoned to relieve Carrillo, gave up two runs over the final 3⅔ innings as the Mets fell behind six runs in an eventual 8-4 defeat.
The Mets lost the following day 5-2 before winning the series finale Sunday. But losing the first two games sealed the season series for the Reds, giving them the critical tiebreaker between the clubs. Flip either loss and the Mets advance to the postseason with a better record than Cincinnati.
Aug 3: Montas struggles, and Mets lose first place for good
Record: 63-49
Division: Second place (0.5 games back)
Reds' record: 58-54 (five games back)
Mets' playoff projection: 93.6%
Over the winter, the Mets signed Frankie Montas to a two-year, $34 million contract with a player option for 2026 after Luis Severino, coming off a rebound season in Queens, declined a similar offer. The pivot yielded disappointing results. Montas strained a lat during spring training and didn't make his season debut until June 24. That day he tossed five scoreless innings. Otherwise, it was a struggle for the veteran right-hander.
With fans clamoring for the organization to call up one of their three prized pitching prospects, Montas walked off the mound Aug. 3 with a 6.68 ERA in seven starts after surrendering seven runs over four innings to the San Francisco Giants. That was enough for a demotion to the bullpen, where Montas made two multi-inning outings over the next 11 days before an MRI revealed a tear in the ulnar collateral ligament in his right elbow.
Montas made his final appearance, a two-inning effort, Aug. 15 and is expected to miss the entire 2027 season after undergoing Tommy John surgery in early September. With that, the Frankie Montas era in Queens is likely over after 38⅔ innings pitched.
The Mets said: "It's awful. It's hard for him. He was pretty devastated yesterday when he found out, and rightfully so. It's been a hard year for him." -- Mendoza
Aug. 10: Walk-off loss to Milwaukee to complete sweep
Record: 63-55
Division: Second place (5.5 games back)
Reds' record: 62-57 (1.5 games back)
Mets' playoff projection: 77.5%
The Mets traveled to Milwaukee on a four-game losing streak with eight losses over their past nine games. The Brewers, on the other hand, were on a six-game winning streak. The momentum continued on both sides as New York was swept over the weekend in a series bookended by one-run losses.
The finale was particularly painful for the Mets: Nursing a one-run lead into the eighth inning, Ryan Helsley, one of the three relievers the club landed at the trade deadline, surrendered a ground ball that bounced over a diving Pete Alonso at first base for a game-tying, two-out RBI single. An inning later, Isaac Collins swatted a walk-off home run off Edwin Díaz to send the Mets home with their second of three losing streaks of at least seven games this season.
For Helsley, the outing was part of a hellish beginning to his Mets tenure. The hard-throwing right-hander, acquired from the St. Louis Cardinals, surrendered 20 runs (16 earned) in 13 innings over his first 16 appearances as a Met. Helsley was one of our four players the Mets added at the trade deadline when the team held a half-game lead atop the NL East.
The moves were initially lauded, but only right-hander Trevor Rogers fulfilled expectations. In addition to Helsley's struggles, left-hander Gregory Soto posted a 4.70 ERA in 24 appearances and center fielder Cedric Mullins recorded a .569 OPS in 41 games. The performances, coupled with the Mets deciding not to acquire a starting pitcher, rendered the haul of impending free agents a disappointment.
The Mets said: "We made the decisions we made at the time with the information we had. I'm very comfortable with the process we went through that led us to those decisions. But, yeah, we did not play well during the month of August and, frankly, to this point through September. We've had various segments of our team that haven't performed to the level that we certainly anticipated as we approached the trade deadline, and had I had that knowledge going in, yes, it would've changed what we did." -- president of baseball operations David Stearns, Sept. 1
Sept. 8: One-run loss opens four-game sweep in Philadelphia
Record: 76-68
Division: Second place (11 games back)
Reds' record: 72-72 (Four games back)
Mets' playoff projection: 92.2%
The Mets arrived in Philadelphia for a four-game series starting Sept. 8 trailing the Phillies by seven games in the NL East. The Mets gave the ball to Nolan McLean for his fifth career start in the opener, and the rookie continued his success in the majors, holding the Phillies to one run over 5⅓ innings. But that was all Philadelphia needed in a deflating 1-0 loss that set the tone for the series.
The Phillies outscored New York 26-10 over the next three days, completing a thorough sweep to effectively end the division race with a season-high 11-game lead with just 15 games remaining.
Sept. 12: DeGrom shuts down Mets in return to Citi Field
Record: 76-72
Division: Second place (12 games back)
Reds' record: 74-73 (1.5 games back)
Mets' playoff projection: 72.8%
The Mets returned to New York the next day for a matchup between past and future. For the Mets, 22-year-old rookie Jonah Tong took the mound against the Rangers for his third career start. Opposite him was 37-year-old Jacob deGrom, himself a former Mets homegrown right-hander who became the best pitcher in the world before leaving for Texas, in his first start at Citi Field as an opponent.
The matchup didn't last long. Tong was bounced in the first inning after giving up six runs and securing just two outs. On the other side, deGrom, a two-time NL Cy Young Award winner in Queens, continued his rebound All-Star season after two injury-plagued campaigns to begin his career in Texas by holding the Mets to three runs over seven innings despite registering just two strikeouts.
It was a different deGrom from the overpowering, untouchable version that had climbed to the sport's peak from 2018 through 2021. And it was plenty good enough to extend the Mets' losing streak, which reached a seasonlong eight games with a loss the next day.
The Mets said: "He was a show. He was the guy that people came to the ballpark to watch him pitch." -- Mendoza
Sept. 21: Mets drop another series to Washington, fall from postseason position
Record: 80-76
Division: Second place (12 games back)
Reds' record: 80-76
Mets' playoff projection: 51.6%
The Mets' slow-motion plunge reached its nadir in their final home game of the season: a 3-2 loss to the Nationals to drop New York's second series in six weeks against the last-place club. Coupled with the Reds' win over the Cubs, the Mets fell out of playoff position for the first time since April 5. The result was demoralizing with six games remaining. How it happened made it especially so.
The Mets, sloppy all weekend, managed just two runs against the tandem of Jake Irvin and Mitchell Parker, who entered the day with the two highest ERAs in the majors among qualified pitchers. On the other side, the Mets' $38 million piggyback of Sean Manaea and Clay Holmes gave up three runs over six innings.
To top it off, the Mets watched Nationals center fielder Jacob Young make two jaw-dropping, game-changing catches. The first, a circus grab in which he kicked the ball to himself, robbed Brett Baty of extra bases in the fifth inning. The second took away a potential game-tying home run for Francisco Alvarez in the ninth. It was a brutal day to end an ugly weekend.
The Mets said: "We just got to win. It's simple. Winning solves everything at this point. We just got to do it. That's it. We got to solve our issues between the lines. That's the simple fact." -- first baseman Pete Alonso
Sept. 27: The end in Miami
Record: 83-79
Division: Second place (13 games back)
Reds' record: 83-79
Mets' playoff projection: 0.0%
In the end, all the Mets needed to do was win. The Brewers defeated the Reds 4-2, which meant a Mets win would have given them a better record and the final spot in the postseason. Instead, they were shut out by the Marlins. They gave up four runs in the fourth inning, and their closer, Edwin Diaz, pitched the fifth. They loaded the bases with two outs in the top of the fifth, and Pete Alonso hit a 116-mph laser -- their hardest-hit ball all year -- that Javier Sanoja snagged in left field. They left 10 men on base and went 0-for-8 with runners in scoring position. In the top of the eighth, Francisco Alvarez struck out with two men on, slamming his bat over his knee as he left the batter's box.
With a win, they'd face the Dodgers in the division series. Instead, the Mets are headed back to New York after one of the worst collapses in their history.
The Mets said: "We failed the job. We failed the mission. It was on the players, it was on me, to get the job done, and we didn't get it done." -- Lindor