Kevin Kernan

Kevin Kernan

MLB

The many ways the Mets are sabotaging their offense

ATLANTA — No team can make three outs faster than the Mets.

The Mets have a hitting philosophy, it’s called Hunting Strikes.

How about changing that to Hunting Hits.

Ervin Santana made his first start for the Braves, and he toyed with the Mets in a 4-3 win Wednesday night at Turner Field. Santana’s first 20 pitches were strikes. He went right after the Mets hitters, knowing they could not do any serious damage as he breezed through eight shutout innings, allowing only three hits and no walks.

If this keeps up, it is going to be another long season for the Mets and their tortured fans.

The Mets did score three times in the ninth against Jordan Walden and Craig Kimbrel, and with the potential tying run on third, Kimbrel threw a high fastball right past Ruben Tejada for the final out of the game. Kimbrel also struck out Lucas Duda in the inning, giving the Mets 79 strikeouts over the first eight games.

Zack Wheeler’s pitches, meanwhile, were waist high and the Braves did not miss. Jason Heyward led off the Braves’ first inning with a home run on the 11th pitch of the at-bat, and the Braves put the game away with three runs in the fifth.

General manager Sandy Alderson has made it clear throughout the organization he wants patient hitters or the Mets will look for more patient hitters.

The system is not working.

“No matter what the count is, we’re not doing any damage with pitches,’’ said manager Terry Collins, who defended the Mets’ hitting philosophy.

Santana essentially threw strikes and dared the Mets to swing.

The night started with five of the Mets’ eight position players in the lineup, including David Wright, batting under .200. Wright did pick up two hits to climb to .233.

The Mets came into this series asking for trouble with the benching of Ike Davis. Davis blasted a pinch-hit, game-winning grand slam Sunday and had base hits in four of his last six at-bats. He was as hot as he could ever hope to be but the Mets had made the decision beforehand to start Duda, essentially sitting their hottest hitter.

That is a stubborn approach by management.

Davis will start Thursday as the first base saga continues.

“You want to play every day,’’ Davis told The Post. “It doesn’t matter if you strike out six times, you just want to be in the lineup. It’s hard to change things on the bench.’’

How easy was it for Santana, who was making his first start as a Brave? He breezed through those eight innings, throwing just 88 pitches.

As for the Mets’ total of nine strikeouts on the night and 79 for the season, you really have to start to question the approach the Mets have as an organization that strikeouts don’t matter. The Mets are hitting .190 as a team.

It’s left to Collins to answer the questions about his team’s lack of hitting and reliance on the home run.

“Santana pounded the zone and used his changeup to get our lefty hitters off balance,’’ Collins said.

He also said Roy Halladay is the only other pitcher he saw start off a game with 20 strikes in a row.

Opposing pitchers clearly don’t fear the Mets’ batters.

“You look up and you’re 0-1 and 0-2,’’ Collins said.

“It goes back to the same things for us, it’s all about getting a ball to hit and putting a good swing on it. If they get you in holes, you got to start thinking middle of the field and take away thinking about hitting the ball out of the ballpark unless you get something good to hit. With two strikes, I want to use the whole field to hit.’’

Collins said the Mets hitters are not being too passive.

“You look up in the seventh inning, and he didn’t have many pitches,’’ he said of Santana.

Could be that Santana didn’t feel the need to waste any pitches against the .190 Mets.