The New York Mets rallied back with five runs in the eighth and ninth innings Sunday afternoon but fell one run short as the Texas Rangers topped the Mets 8-7 in the first game of a Fathers Day doubleheader.

After Ramon Castro hit a two out, two-RBI, pinch-hit single to cut the deficit to one, Damian Easley flied out to left to end the game.

John Maine lost his no-hit bid in the third inning when Rangers catcher Gerald Laird opened with a single to left to increase the NoNoHitters.com count to 7,387 games without a New York Mets no hitter.

John Maine gave up a first-inning single to the Los Angeles Dodgers’ James Loney Friday night to push the NoNoHitters.com count to 7,373 (”73-73″) games without a New York Mets no hitter.

Here in Mets land, 73 is our third favorite number second only to 69 and 86! (I guess double-zero would place fourth, but that memory is a bit soured by that team across town.)

We passed 6,969 no no-nos three seasons ago, and if our starting pitchers continue to insist on giving up at least one hit each game we would pass the 8,686 mark sometime during the 2016 season (here’s hoping that the team isn’t wearing anything close to Mercury Mets jerseys by that time).

Continuing this off-course wandering into amateur numerology, I’m looking at New York Mets game number 7,396 as the franchise’s first no hitter.

Why? The number 7,396 is a perfect square of 86 (in other words 86 x 86 = 7,396), and clearly 86 is the luckiest number in team history. Sure ‘69 was great, but there were clearly greater forces at work in ‘86.

So when is game 7,396? If there are no rainouts in the next month, game 7,396 would be played June 24, 2008, against the Seattle Mariners at Shea.

Anyway, back to Friday night’s game. It ended in a 9-5 loss, thanks in part to a strong early relief appearance by ex-Met Chan Ho Park and a 4-4 outing by Russell Martin. Oh yeah, and a horrendous relief appearance by Aaron Heilman, who faced four batters in the eighth and gave up four hits and four earned runs.

On a more positive note, Jose Reyes went 2-4 to extend his hitting streak to 15 games.

The first hit off John Maine didn’t come until the fourth inning Sunday afternoon but it did a bit of damage. Rockies’ outfielder Seth Smith hit his first major league home run - a three-run dinger to deep right - to bump the NoNoHitters.com count to 7,368 games without a New York Mets no hitter.

Jose Reyes extended his hitting streak to 10 games with a third-inning single, but it was one of just four hits the Mets could muster during a 4-1 loss to the Colorado Rockies. The Mets dropped two games below .500 and now head home to Shea to face the first place Florida Marlins and the Los Angeles Dodgers.

Tom Glavine beat his former team by retiring his last 17 hitters as the Braves beat the Mets in the afternoon game of a day-night doubleheader.

The Braves’ Yunel Escobar led off with a double off of John Maine to up the NoNoHitters.com count to 7,362.

The Washington Nationals’ Austin Kearns hit a second-inning single off of John Maine Tuesday night to put the New York Mets NoNoHitters.com count at 7,357 games without a no hitter.

Maine’s strong outing during the Mets 6-3 win earned him his fifth victory of the season. He lasted six innings, yielding just one other hit, one walk and one earned run to drop his season ERA down to 2.81. Maine struck out five.

Billy Wagner got his eighth save of the season and has still yet to give up an earned run this season.

Right fielder Ryan Church went 2-for-4 with a double, a homer and 4 RBIs. Catcher Brian Schneider went 3-for-4 with a double, an RBI and two runs scored.

The Los Angeles Dodgers’ Chin-lung Hu doubled to deep right with one out in the third inning Wednesday to bump the NoNoHitters.com to 7,352 games without a New York Mets no hitter.

It was one of just four hits given up by starter John Maine, who took a shutout into the ninth inning before giving up a double, walk and a single in the ninth for the Dodgers sole run. Duaner Sanchez retired the next two batters to seal the Mets’ 12-1 victory.

The Diamondbacks’ Chris Young lead off the bottom half of the first with a single up the middle off John Maine Friday night to advance the NoNoHitters.com count to 7,347 New York Mets games without a no hitter.

It’s the 884th potential no hitter broken up by a leadoff hit, so we’ve again updated our No hitters killed by first at bat page. For the record, 667 of those games were killed by a single, and 471 of the games were played on the road.

Maine didn’t have his best stuff, but he plowed through for the win, giving up two runs and six hits in six innings of work. He struck out six and walked two (both times the opposing pitcher). The Mets won 7-2.

Mark Teixeira broke up a no hitter for the second game in a row, this time with a first-inning RBI double to left center off John Maine. That raises the NoNoHitters.com count to 7,343 New York Mets games without a no hitter.

Maine held the Atlanta Braves to just three hits, two earned runs and three walks in his five innings of work. Maine also struck out seven.