WASHINGTON — The Mets finished the road portion of their schedule in appropriately ridiculous fashion here yesterday with a 7-4, walk-off loss to the Nationals on Justin Maxwell’s grand slam against Francisco Rodriguez.
Rodriguez was a total disaster in the ninth, giving up two hits and walking in a run before serving the slam to Maxwell on a 3-2 pitch as the Mets finished 29-52 away from Citi Field.
Maxwell’s second career slam — the second walk-off slam given up by Rodriguez in the past two months — slipped just over the glove of Angel Pagan in left field, completing an embarrassing three-game sweep by baseball’s worst team.
It was K-Rod’s seventh blown save of the season and wasted six strong innings of one-run ball by Tim Redding against Redding’s former team.
Washington had been 0-87 this season when behind entering the ninth inning before yesterday.
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Reliever Pedro Feliciano broke his own franchise record by appearing in his major-league high 87th game.
Feliciano set the previous Mets mark last season.
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Mike Pelfrey left the Mets before the game to be with his ailing grandfather in Ohio and will not return this season.
Pelfrey went out on a high note, allowing just three runs in seven innings here Tuesday, but was a disappointment overall at 10-12 with a 5.03 ERA as the No. 2 starter.
The former first-round pick said he realizes he faces a potential make-or-break season with the Mets in 2010.
“Without question, I’ve had a tough year,” Pelfrey said. “But believe me when I say that I’m going to come back ready to go and have a very, very good year next year. I’m going to learn from this and move on.”
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The Mets will give away game-worn jerseys after every game of this weekend’s season-ending homestand at Citi Field.
The club said 25 fans will be chosen randomly during each game to receive a jersey immediately afterward that was worn in that particular game.
The fans will be slotted 1-to-25 based on when they were chosen and get their choice of jersey based on that order.