The Padres lost a three-game series to the Mets this afternoon, 7-3.

Despite an outstanding performance on all sides the night before (offense and pitching), the Padres weren’t able to pull through Wednesday, leaving Padres fans wondering if the season of losing would ever end.

Starter Mat Latos was solid, only making one big mistake. He threw six innings, allowing three runs with six strikeouts. All three runs came on a three-run homer to Mets third baseman David Wright in the third inning. (Wow, that’s a lot of threes.) Unfortunately, his offense wasn’t able to back him up and he got the loss, his 12th of the year.

The Padres only got three runs in the game, with two of them coming in the bottom of the ninth. Nick Hundley doubled in Aaron Cunningham with no outs, and then Alberto Gonzalez doubled in Hundley right before Jason Bartlett struck out to end the game.

But the Mets had no such problem. Angel Pagan, leading off in the lineup, had two hits and three RBIs. That, coupled with Wright’s bomb and Willie Harris’ RBI single in the eighth gave New York more than enough to win the game.  

Padres fans know that the team isn’t going to go anywhere, at least not this season, but it would always be nice to have some good games during the last few months of the season, like Tuesday’s 6-1 win. But a series like this shows why the Padres are 15 games out of first place: even if they are able to have a solid game, they aren’t able to carry that momentum even to a game the very next day. Consistency, momentum, whatever you want to call it, the Padres don’t have it. And that’s why they are stuck in the cellar of the NL West.

The Padres will host the Florida Marlins for the next four games over the weekend, leading up to Trevor Hoffman’s retirement ceremony before the game on Sunday. You won’t want to miss it.

GO PADRES!!!!!!