The Mets on Sunday designated left-handed reliever Casey Fossum for assignment and signed Ken Takahashi to their 40-man roster. Fossum only gave up one earned run in his four innings pitched and had a 2.25 ERA. However, he had the misfortune of following Oliver Perez in two of those outings and could not get outs and allowed the runners on base to score multiple times.

Takahashi is also a left-hander and had a 0.77 ERA in 11 2/3 innings at Triple-A Buffalo. Fossum was called up after Nelson Figueroa was designated for assignment. Figueroa has re-signed with the Mets after trying out the free agency market.

If the Mets’ starters could go more than five innings, maybe they wouldn’t need to have this revolving door of middle relievers, or just get a reliable long man until the starters get back on track.

It’s exactly what the Mets needed and, as it turns out, a brilliant bit of scheduling. Before entering the series against the Washington Nationals, the Mets were on a downward spiral having lost four games in a row, sitting at fourth place in the division with a 6-9 record.

After two strong starts and wins by Johan Santana and Mike Pelfrey, the Mets have closed to within three games of the Florida Marlins and one game of the Atlanta Braves and Philadelphia Phillies. So, the Nationals series couldn’t have come at a better time.

It’s a chance to find the Mets’ groove again, to boost their confidence and morale, and get back to the fundamentals. For the most part, they’re doing that. They’re winning the games they should win. They’re doing just enough to get by, and maybe right now that’s good enough.

However, that’s not going to be good enough when the Marlins come to town on Monday. There are still some glaring problems, namely hitting in bases-loaded situations, David Wright’s league-leading strikeouts and Daniel Murphy’s defense, that need to be fixed. Although, to be fair, Murphy did have an amazing catch and double-up Saturday.

Manuel’s decision to move Wright to the fifth hole was a brilliant one as it turns out as Wright is still struggling with his swing and Carlos Beltran has been on fire, leading the National League in batting average. Maybe Manuel should consider moving Wright down even farther in the lineup, where there is a little less pressure. Fortunately, Wright’s hitting woes haven’t seeped into his defense, as he showed Saturday.

Even with the League’s top two hitters in Beltran and Luis Castillo, the Mets still can’t seem to hit with the bases loaded. It’s to the point where you expect them to go down quietly. It happened Friday night in a game that should’ve been blown wide open, yet basically was won due to some shoddy Nationals defense. The Mets were just 2-for-18 with runners in scoring position that night.

The Mets did show marked improvement in Saturday’s 8-2 win. That’s the kind of score the Mets should put up against the Nationals. They improved their hitting with runners in scoring position to 4-for-11. The bullpen threw a scoreless 3 1/3 innings in relief of Pelfrey, who went more than five innings. The team, for the most part, executed defensively.

Those are the kind of things the Mets need to do to beat the Marlins on Monday. They need to improve on Saturday’s showing, keep the momentum going Sunday with Oliver Perez on the mound and go into Monday on a three-game winning streak.

It didn’t take too long for Nelson Figueroa to realize that the Mets are the best place for him now, especially since no other team apparently wants him.

After testing the free agency market, Figueroa decided to re-sign with the Mets on Saturday and will be back at Triple-A Buffalo. Some of you said he’d be back and you were right.

It sounds like Jerry Manuel is giving each starter another chance to prove themselves. Mike Pelfrey did it Saturday, though doing so against the Major League worst Washington Nationals hardly seems like a test. We’ll see if Oliver Perez can do the same today, but if his track record against bad teams is any testament, he might struggle.

So, if Livan Hernandez gives another bad performance, is it time to bring in Figgy or call up someone else like Jonathon Niese?

In other news, the Mets also signed journeyman and utility man Mike Lamb, whom the Brewers released on April 1, to join Figueroa in Buffalo after a stint in extended Spring Training in Florida.

The Mets will have to limp back home to New York on Friday after losing, 12-8, their fourth game in a row and their third game against the St. Louis Cardinals for a series sweep.

Once again, the Mets starting pitching failed them, putting them into a hole from which they could not recover. Livan Hernandez did not make it out of the fifth inning, giving up seven runs on nine hits, including three home runs, two by Albert Pujols.

The Cardinals pounded the Mets pitchers all afternoon. It was like batting practice for them. Even Sean Green was tagged for five earned runs. Jerry Manuel must have wanted to preserve the rest of the bullpen because after the Cardinals put up a four spot on Green in the sixth inning, he sent him out for the seventh where he gave up another run. You would think Manuel would have pulled him in the sixth after a couple of runs scored.

The Mets again had their chances to score and were helped out by two balks by Cardinals pitchers. But some really good Cardinals defense stood in the way.

The lineup change seemed to have helped as Carlos Beltran, who batted third, went 3-for-5 with a home run and three RBI. On the flip side, David Wright had a good day as well as he had two hits and drove in a run. Ryan Church had two hits and hit his first home run of the young season.

Yet the Mets are still struggling in bases-loaded situations. Gary Sheffield, who started in place of Daniel Murphy in left field, grounded into a double play and didn’t get a hit all game. Manuel said he wanted to give Sheffield some playing time, but he hasn’t warranted it. Sheffield’s batting average is down to .111. Ironically, Fernando Tatis, who should be given his shot, has the same average. But’s appeared in only five games with seven at-bats. He is being criminally underused so far.

Now, the Mets have to hope their ace can be the stopper against the even lowlier Washington Nationals. Johan Santana will face the Nationals’ Scott Olsen, who is 0-2 with a 9 ERA.

It’s the perfect timing for a series against the worst team in Major League Baseball. It’s the perfect remedy for what is ailing the Mets. What better way to rebound from a series sweep than to sweep a team yourself and get momentum back on your side. Nothing less than a series win should be deemed as a failure and would prompt some serious talk about a shakeup.

Nelson Figueroa, who made one start in place of Mike Pelfrey and pitched decently, will probably refuse to be sent down to Triple-A Buffalo and plans to announce he will become a free agent, according to The Daily News.

Figueroa, whose wife reportedly shared her disapproval of the way the Mets handled her husband’s professional career, bounced around with assorted teams before joining the Mets in 2008. He made various spot starts last year, with an overall 3-3 record and 4.57 ERA.

Are you sorry to see him go? What did you think about his contributions to the team?

It’s hardly worth wasting the energy to write this post as the Mets fell to the St. Louis Cardinals 5-2 in a listless offensive performance and are now in fourth place in the division.

Starter John Maine gave up five earned runs in 5 2/3 innings. It was another pitiful performance by a Mets starting pitcher. The starting rotation has got to be a major cause for concern as Johan Santana is the only bright spot. The five Mets starters are combining for over a 6 ERA. That’s pretty bad when Santana has an ERA of 0.46.

Daniel Murphy partly made up for last night’s performance by getting an RBI single to score the first Mets run and making a good throw to home, even though it did not turn into an out. Carlos Beltran was the only Met to have more than one hit.

Manager Jerry Manuel says he’s shaking up the lineup for Thursday’s game, resting Murphy, Luis Castillo and Ramon Castro. He said Gary Sheffield will start in left, Alex Cora will replace Castillo and Omir Santos will give Castro a rest. He also said he might change the batting order a little bit by flip-flopping David Wright with Beltran.

Hopefully, some fresh blood will offer a different outcome. Livan Hernandez faces off against Kyle Lohse.

For all of you Verizon FIOS TV subscribers out there in Rockland and Westchester counties (sorry, Putnam residents), you can now catch Mets games on demand.

Verizon and SNY have reached an agreement to offer 120 HD games free of charge. The games will be available up to three days after their original air date. The games will be available in the SNY Folder, found in both the FiOS1 “Local Zone” and “Sports” categories.

Big East football and basketball games, as well as other SNY shows, also will be available on demand.

The Associated Press

NEW YORK—Someone got a bargain with Bernard Madoff’s Mets season tickets.

The two seats in the Delta Club Gold section behind home plate auctioned for $38,100 Tuesday on eBay, well below the list price for the pair of about $56,000.

The sale by lawyer Irving H. Picard, the trustee overseeing the liquidation of Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities, covers 75 remaining games this season at Citi Field. The seats averaged $375 per game over the full season, ranging from $225-$525 per game, but the average for the remaining games is slightly less because the six games already played have been just above the average under the Mets’ variable pricing plan.

Madoff originally purchased two seats in the Delta Club Platinum section in the second row behind home plate, which averaged $495 and ranged from $295-$695. The trustee exchanged those seats for the Delta Club Gold seats, Nos. 5-6 in the eighth row of section 11, just to the home plate side of the Mets’ dugout.

The team agreed to refund to the trustee the $19,440 difference between the face values.

Just five bids were made for the season tickets, with the losing bids coming in at $31,000, $33,000, $35,000 and $38,000.

Madoff’s tickets for the April 13 opener against San Diego sold for $7,500 to a man who identified himself as 47-year-old Kurt. He took his 16-year-old son as Mike to the game, a 6-5 Mets loss.

Mets owners Fred Wilpon and Saul Katz were close to Madoff, who pleaded guilty March 12 in federal court to 11 counts, including securities fraud and perjury, stemming from a Ponzi scheme prosecutors said was worth $64.8 billion. The 70-year-old Madoff faces up to 150 years in prison at sentencing June 16.

Wilpon, Katz and many entities of their company, Sterling Equities, and various affiliated foundations are among the swindled creditors.

The Mets fell below .500 and lost their first game, 6-4, against the St. Louis Cardinals in what had to be the ugliest game of the season so far.

Frankly, it’s a game the Mets should have lost. When Daniel Murphy slipped and fell to turn an out into a triple, you knew the game was going downhill. In addition, Carlos Beltran’s base-running blunder led to him being thrown out at home, quashing a possible Mets rally and at least a lead. Beltran chose not to slide into home after a ball was misplayed at third and ended up stepping on Cardinals catcher Yadier Molina’s foot instead of the plate.

Mets starter Oliver Perez was his typical self, pitching three scoreless innings and then couldn’t get out of the fifth inning, going 4 2/3 innings and giving up four earned runs. He just barely got out of a bases-loaded fourth inning, even though a double-play out was miscalled. But he couldn’t get the third out in the fifth, even though Jerry Manuel gave him three chances to do so.

Then left hander Casey Fossum came on to relieve Perez and threw four straight balls. Fossum took Nelson Figueroa’s roster spot after he was designated for assignment. Bullpen stalwart JJ Putz gave up an uncharacteristic two earned runs, thanks in part to Murphy’s misplayed ball.

Is the Murphy experiment in left field over or would you stick with him? If so, with whom would you replace him?

The Mets are keeping Dwight Gooden’s signature — but moving it to another location and putting it under Plexiglass.

Gooden pitcher signed a wall in the Ebbets Club when he attended the April 13 opener at Citi Field, writing: “Doc Gooden/84 R.O.Y./85 Cy Young/86 W.S. champs,” according to Mets spokesman Jay Horwitz. Perturbed that a clean wall in a new ballpark had been marked up, the team at first said it planned to erase the writing. Following criticism, the team changed course.

“It’s a new building. We just didn’t want anything written on the walls,” Horwitz told the Associated Press from St. Louis before the Mets’ game against the Cardinals. “We had a lot of calls yesterday, a lot of fan stuff.”

Horwitz said the team now plans to encourage other former Mets stars to follow Gooden’s lead. “The plan is we’re going to move this to a yet-to-be determined place in the stadium, behind plexiglass,” he said. “And then when other players come back, like the Strawberrys, the Seavers and the Koosmans, we’ll have them writing similar greetings to the fans.”

There’s been some talk lately on the sports radio stations about Jerry Manuel’s management decisions regarding benching a red-hot Ryan Church in favor of playing Gary Sheffield and not having Fernando Tatis lay down a bunt with two on and no outs in Sunday’s loss to the Milwaukee Brewers.

I agree that Manuel should’ve had Tatis bunt in that situation, but even then I’m sure the Mets would’ve found a way not to score those two base runners. Clutch hitting, for the most part, is still a nagging problem. I posted a poll yesterday asking if you were the manager, what would you focus on? One of the answers was hitting in big situations.

A commenter responded with how does a manager teach that? Well, maybe it’s not a management technique that can address that issue; maybe it’s a question of team leadership. It’s one person stepping up to the plate, literally and figuratively.

Some say the face of the team is David Wright and that he is kind of a de facto team leader. But other than a clutch hit earlier in the season, he really hasn’t been able to get the big hit. His batting average is above .300, but a lot of those hits come with nobody on base or when the Mets are already leading.

So, who can be the leader of this team? Is there anyone on the roster who can be a leader, or do the Mets have to go outside of the organization to find someone?

Getting back to benching Church, I think Manuel should’ve kept riding the hot hand. Sure, Sheffield hit his 500th home run and that was wonderful, but since then, he’s gone 1 for 6. Not only has Sheffield been cold at the plate, he replaced two of the hottest hitters on the team in two consecutive games: Church and Daniel Murphy, who has a six-game hitting streak and went 3-for-5 in his last outing.

It was ludicrous of Manuel to do that. I don’t care if instead of Sheffield it was Albert Puljos. Did he really think Murphy needed the rest? Wait until you’re on a winning streak, then you can rest your regulars. Other than Sheffield’s home run, he has shown nothing to warrant his starting over Murphy and Church.

So, is it still too early to question Manuel’s judgment? My answer is no. That’s what being a fan is all about. You celebrate when you’re winning and criticize when you’re not. Right now, I’m criticizing.

The Mets have signed former Washington National Wily Mo Pena to a Minor League contract. He’ll start out in Triple-A Buffalo for extended Spring Training.

Pena rejected a Minor League offer from the Nationals, where he hit .205 in 64 games last season. Pena, whom the Mets had signed as an amateur free agent in 1998, hit 77 home runs with three different teams. Ironically, all three teams wore red on their uniforms. He played for the Cincinnati Reds, the Red Sox and the Nationals.

In other news from over the weekend, submarine-style pitcher Darren O’Day was designated for assignment to make room for Nelson Figueroa, who pitched well in place of Mike Pelfrey who was not placed on the disabled list, even though he has right forearm tendinitis.

O’Day was a Rule 5 Draft pickup from the Los Angeles Angels, who now has the opportunity to take him back. This is the first time the Mets are without a submarine-style pitcher in several years. The Mets gave up Joe Smith in a three-team trade in the off-season. Smith replaced Chad Bradford, who pitched for the Mets in 2006.

I was sorry to see both relievers go as they both pitched well for the Mets during their stints. Bradford has pitched well for the Baltimore Orioles and 2008 American League champs Tampa Bay Rays. Smith has a 2.45 ERA with the Indians.

Congratulations to Antonio Labriola of Mamaroneck, who correctly answered the first Mets Contest question: In the Jackie Robinson Rotunda at Citi Field, what does it say on the floor under the heading Courage?

The answer is: “In 1947, Jackie broke baseball’s color barrier, becoming the first African-American player in Major League Baseball’s modern era, opening doors for generations of Americans.”

Labriola was randomly selected among the correct entries and will be receiving a copy of the New York Mets Essential Games of Shea Stadium DVD set.

This week’s question is: Which former Mets player is the Mets broadcast booth named after?

Each week, we’ll ask a question related to Citi Field. We’ll then take all the names of people who got the question correct and put them in a random drawing. Each winner will receive either the “The New York Mets: Essential Games of Shea Stadium DVD Set” or “The NY Mets 1986 World Series Collector’s Edition DVD Set.” Only one prize per winner will be given out.

Check back every Monday at http://mets.lohudblogs.com to see that week’s question.

Click here to register and answer the question.

This week’s question: At this point in the season, which area would you focus on to “fix” the team, if you were the manager?

Despite a good performance by Nelson Figueroa, who was filling in for Mike Pelfrey, the Mets once again could not capitalize on scoring chances and lost 4-2 to the Milwaukee Brewers.

The Mets are now 6-6 for the season and tied with the Phillies for second place in the division behind the almost-perfect Florida Marlins.

The Mets just could not get it done on offense, despite 12 hits, as they left 10 runners on base and could not capitalize on a bases-loaded situation with Carlos Delgado at the plate and an eighth-inning potential rally that ended with backup catcher Omir Santos hitting into a double play. Santos, who was called up when Brian Schneider was placed on the 15-day disabled list, was impressive in his first start gunning down a base runner trying to steal and going 2-for-4 at the plate.

Both Jose Reyes and Daniel Murphy had three hits on the day.

The Mets have Monday off before facing the Cardinals in St. Louis on Tuesday.