The Mets looked lifeless for seven innings. They’ve never been more alive.

PHILADELPHIA — Mentally drained from a seven-games-in-as-many-days gantlet with their very survival on the line, facing a hated but well-rested division rival in the most intimidating road atmosphere in baseball, handcuffed for seven innings by the premier postseason pitcher in the game, down a run as the eighth inning began, the New York Mets, as any of their emotionally wrecked, bleary-eyed fans could tell you, had the Philadelphia Phillies right where they wanted them.

For any other team, this particular set of circumstances might have spelled certain doom, or at least served as a free pass to roll over and try again tomorrow. For the death-defiant Mets, Game 1 of the National League Division Series didn't even get interesting until things were at their bleakest.

By both degree of difficulty and proximity to elimination, the Mets' 6-2 victory Saturday at Citizens Bank Park, sparked by a five-run eighth inning against the Phillies' bullpen, didn't come close to approaching some of their epic exploits of the past week — the insane double-comeback in Atlanta on Monday that clinched a playoff berth on the final day of the regular season or the four-run ninth inning in Milwaukee on Thursday that put them in the NLDS.

But for the Mets, Saturday's flick-of-a-switch transition from lifelessness to life-affirming was as quick and thorough as any of them.

"We have a big belief system in that clubhouse," Mets left fielder Brandon Nimmo said, "that if we keep taking our shots, over the course of a nine-inning game we're going to break through."

They entered the eighth trailing 1-0 after managing just one hit while striking out nine times against Phillies ace Zack Wheeler. Twenty-four minutes later, they exited the top half of the inning with a 5-1 lead, having strung together five singles, a walk and two sacrifice flies against Phillies relievers Jeff Hoffman, Matt Strahm and Orion Kerkering, each of whose slow walks back to the dugout was accompanied by smatterings of boos from the sellout crowd of 45,751.

The tying run came home on Mark Vientos's line-drive single to left, the go-ahead run on Nimmo's groundball single to left. But it was Jose Iglesias's at-bat against Strahm in the middle of the rally that served as a microcosm of the inning, if not the Mets' entire, preposterous existence.

With a runner on first, one out and the Mets ahead 3-1, Iglesias quickly fell behind in the count 0-2, then fouled off seven straight two-strike pitches from Strahm — a mixture of cutters, sliders and 93-mph fastballs — before finding one he could handle. On the 10th pitch of the at-bat, he rapped a single up the middle. It was one of five plate appearances during the inning in which the Mets' batter reached base and/or drove in a run after falling behind 0-2.

"We don't have a team that's going to go out there and run through people," Mets shortstop Francisco Lindor said. "We have to do the little things right in order for us to win."

Citizens Bank Park might be home to the best postseason atmosphere in baseball — one that carries its own trademarked name, "Red October" — and it's never truer than for a late Saturday afternoon start, the shadows creeping across the green expanse, both the Philadelphia skyline and the heart of Saturday night beckoning in the near distance.

A large chunk of the sellout crowd stood from the first pitch, student-section style, and stayed there as Wheeler mowed down the Mets in the first, with his fastball touching 99 mph, his highest radar reading of the season.

Those fans were still like that a half-inning later when the Phillies came to bat, and thus didn't even need to jump out of their seats when designated hitter Kyle Schwarber sent the third pitch from Mets right-hander Kodai Senga — a surprise pick to start Game 1, given the fact he was limited by injuries to 51⁄3 innings this season — into the second deck in right field. Mets right fielder Starling Marte never even moved as the 425-foot blast sailed over his head.

It was Schwarber's 21st career postseason homer, fourth all-time behind only Manny Ramirez (29), Jose Altuve (27) and Bernie Williams (22). His five leadoff homers are the most of anyone in postseason history.

But then, just as suddenly, the Phillies' hitters got chase-happy and unable to string together quality at-bats. Senga lasted just two innings, but a trio of Mets relievers — David Peterson (a starter pressed into bullpen duty), Reed Garrett and Phil Maton — turned in a combined six innings of near-flawless relief, with Mets Manager Carlos Mendoza pulling the levers with aplomb.

Wheeler, meanwhile, looked like a pitcher who had been storing up adrenaline for a solid week and angry energy for years, in anticipation of a postseason matchup against the team with which he spent his first five seasons, departing as a free agent in 2020 after the Mets made little to no effort to keep him.

In a season in which the average major league start is just a tick over five innings, this marked the 14th time Wheeler had completed at least seven in 2024. He is the premier postseason pitcher of his generation and one of the best of all time, his ERA of 2.18 ranking as the third lowest in history (minimum 10 starts), behind only Waite Hoyt and Madison Bumgarner. He effectively turns every hitter he faces into the equivalent of a pitcher at the plate (back in the days when pitchers used to hit); opposing hitters have posted a .154 batting average, a .213 on-base percentage and a .237 slugging percentage against him in October.

"This guy's throwing airplanes up there. The ball is taking off every which way. It's like, 'Good luck,'" Mets designated hitter J.D. Martinez said of Wheeler. "The way he was throwing the ball today was unhittable. We just got to get him out of the game. We have to find a way to get him out."

And once Wheeler was gone, it was time for the Mets to do what the Mets do. In Atlanta, that meant a six-run rally in the eighth, then a blown lead, then Lindor's two-run homer in the ninth. In Milwaukee, it was a four-run ninth-inning rally.

"You have games like [those], and it makes you believe in yourselves even more," Nimmo said. "You know, why not us?"