This was the moment when it felt like the walls were about to cave in for good in that last week of September 1999, and Edgardo Alfonzo was officially lost. The Mets had spent the past four months playing superb baseball. Just over a week earlier, safely in the playoff picture, they’d flown to Atlanta a game out of first place, intent on catching the Braves.

The Braves swept them. Then the Phillies swept them, too, at old Veterans Stadium, and the Braves took two out of three back at Shea Stadium, clinching the division in Queens, pouring acid and lime on the remains of the Mets’ season. The Mets were two games out of the wild card with three to pay.

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