A Real New York Mess

Where have you gone, Orel Hershiser, Mickey Hatcher and Mike Davis? The Dodgers nation turns its lonely eyes to you, and you and you.

The Dodgers still haven’t won a playoff game on the road since 1988, and they might not get another chance this year. After the New York Mets dumped the Dodgers for the second consecutive day, this time by a 4-1 score, the Dodgers are one loss away from winter hibernation.

“They’re about to go to sleep, I think,” Mets reliever Pedro Feliciano said.

Tom Glavine stopped the Dodgers with six shutout innings, and no shame in that. But the Dodgers did themselves no favors on the mound or in the field, and their first baseman might have broken down for good.

Their resilience is tempered by reality: The Mets won the first two games of the best-of-five series, and they can eliminate the Dodgers on Saturday at Dodger Stadium.

“We’ll see how good we are,” infielder Jeff Kent said.

They weren’t very good Thursday. Glavine stumped them on four hits over six innings, playing off the Dodgers’ anxiety by feeding them a steady diet of slow, slower and slowest -- batting-practice fastballs, changeups and curves.

“There was some frustration on our side,” Kent said. “He was the wrong guy for us to face in that situation.... We were pressing hard to win a game in New York.”

Rafael Furcal, the Dodgers’ leadoff hitter, has scored once in the series. Kenny Lofton, the No. 2 hitter, has no hits and four strikeouts in eight at-bats. Nomar Garciaparra, the No. 3 hitter, aggravated a strained quadriceps muscle and, for the fourth time in his past five starts, left the game because of injury.

Dodgers Manager Grady Little said Lofton would remain in the lineup but said he would consider replacing Garciaparra with rookie James Loney on Saturday. Garciaparra, also fighting injuries to his side and knee, said the leg “just grabbed” as he ran out an infield single in the fourth inning. He limped down the baseline on a groundout in the sixth and left the game afterward.

That weakened the Dodgers’ defense at a critical time. The Mets led, 2-0, an entirely manageable deficit, particularly because Glavine had just pitched his final inning. David Wright and Cliff Floyd led off the Mets’ sixth with back-to-back singles, and Jose Valentin dropped a bunt down the third-base line.

Garciaparra had just left the game, remember, and Little scrambled his infield by inserting Wilson Betemit at third base, moving Julio Lugo from third base to second and Kent from second base to first.

Betemit took a step toward the ball, then retreated to cover third base. Reliever Brett Tomko took a step toward first base, then reversed direction to retrieve the ball. By that time, he had no chance to throw out Wright at third, and his throw to first appeared to pull Lugo off the bag.

Little said Lugo should have been charged with the error, not Tomko, because Lugo got the ball in time and dropped it. But he also said Betemit and Tomko initially broke the wrong way on the ball, costing the Dodgers a chance at forcing the lead runner.

“It was just a botched-up play,” Little said.

Endy Chavez bounced into a force play at home plate against Mark Hendrickson, so the Mets had the bases loaded and one out. Julio Franco then grounded into an apparent 6-4-3 double play, but the 48-year-old Franco somehow beat the relay.

“We thought we had a good shot to get Franco,” Little said. “The ball was hit just slowly enough.”

So the Mets got one more insurance run, and then another on a single by Jose Reyes, both unearned, and they had a 4-0 lead after six innings. Betemit homered in the eighth inning, off Aaron Heilman, but the Dodgers had no other hits over the final three innings.

And one night after Dodgers starter Derek Lowe failed to survive the sixth inning, Hong-Chih Kuo could not survive the fifth.

Kuo pitched six shutout innings here last month, in his first major league start. He couldn’t throw his fastball with anywhere near the precision he did then, he said, so the Mets exhausted him with foul balls.

He threw 27 pitches in the second inning, 11 on one at-bat to Floyd. He threw 24 pitches in the third. He was done with one out in the fifth, after 85 pitches.

And now the Dodgers might be done. On Oct. 20, 1988, Hershiser pitched a complete game, Hatcher and Davis hit home runs, and the Dodgers won the World Series in Oakland. Since then, they’re 0 for the road in the playoffs, losing in Cincinnati, Atlanta, St. Louis and New York.

They’re 0 for this series too, and the winter could start Saturday.

“We’re down,” Lofton said. “We’re not out.”

bill.shaikin@latimes.com