The Mets opened Sunday in first place in the NL East.
You’d never know it.
Not from the way they got another subpar outing from a starting pitcher, a no-show from the lineup or the boobirds who were out in full force during a 12-4 loss to the Giants at Citi Field.
It’s all part of what’s been a wildly inconsistent few weeks for the Mets, who dropped three straight games around the All-Star break, rebounded with seven consecutive wins, only to then lose four straight.
And after a solid win Saturday, they still dropped a series to the Giants — who raised the white flag by selling at the trade deadline and entered the series losers of six in a row — with Sunday’s lopsided defeat.
Frankie Montas helped throw this one away in his second consecutive clunker — and fourth poor showing in his past six starts.
The right-hander gave up a season-high seven runs — all earned — and didn’t record an out in the fifth.
After retiring the first six batters he faced, Montas fell apart.
The trouble started in the third — with the Mets up by a run — when Jung Hoo Lee singled to lead off the inning, stole second and reached third when Francisco Alvarez’s throw got away from Lindor at second. Lee scored on Patrick Bailey’s liner up the middle.
The inning continued to spiral for Montas, who walked Heliot Ramos before Rafael Devers crushed a two-run shot to right to give the Giants a 4-1 lead.
It got worse in the fourth, with Montas giving up back-to-back singles with one out to put runners on the corners, then Pete Alonso was indecisive on a grounder to first before being late with his throw home, allowing Casey Schmitt to score on the play.
With two out, Ramos beat out a grounder to deep short to drive in another run for a 6-1 lead. Devers piled on with an RBI single.
The offense, which put up a dozen runs — and got 10 RBIs from the top four hitters in the lineup — on Saturday, produced just a pair of runs against lefty Carson Whisenhunt — and has been held to three or fewer runs in four of the past five games.
Whisenhunt was making just his second major league start — and got knocked around by the Pirates in his MLB debut after putting up a 5.98 ERA in his last nine outings in the minors.
The 24-year-old looked like an ace, though, against the Mets.
Lindor homered with one out in the bottom of the first, but the Mets didn’t get another hit until Jeff McNeil opened the bottom of the fifth with a single.
McNeil scored thanks to some Giants incompetence, when Alvarez doubled into the gap in right-center and no one fielded Grant McCray’s throw from right.
Whisenhunt gave up just one earned run in 5 ¹/₃ innings and ex-Met José Buttó got Alonso to ground into an inning-ending double play in the sixth.
Alonso also whiffed with two on to end the eighth.
Perhaps the only positive that came out of the loss was that Carlos Mendoza was able to preserve the team’s new-look bullpen, thanks to Austin Warren — just recalled from Triple-A Syracuse on Sunday — throwing four shutout innings in relief of Montas.
But Ryne Stanek was so bad he couldn’t finish the ninth and had to be replaced by catcher Luis Torrens to get the final out of the inning.
