The MLB-Best Tampa Rays Hit Adversity for the first time this season.

A road trip consisting of at least 10 games is lengthy enough in going from three cities in a short span. A trip involving staying in the same city for a week can perhaps make the trip feel even lengthier than it actually is.

At least that was the sense of the Tampa Bay Rays, who still own the best record in baseball but also experienced their first rough patch by losing six of those games. Five of those were by one run and four were in games played in New York.

The Rays lost by making pitching mistakes last Friday and Saturday against the Yankees, blowing a one-run lead late and then a six-run lead the following day. On the other side of New York, the Rays lost because Pete Fairbanks was the lesser of the two Petes (his words) when he allowed a game-ending three-run homer to Pete Alonso that enabled the Mets to emerge with an 8-7 win that seemed awfully improbable given the negativity around the team with the highest payroll in history stumbling under the .500 mark.

On Thursday afternoon in a game that began nearly 15 hours after Alonso’s homer, the Rays encountered the same problems often afflicting the Yankees and Mets at times. The three-pronged negative axis of scoring early, not adding on and making a critical mistake hit the Rays, who scored early, held a one-run lead and then made a baserunning error before allowing the go-ahead run on a four-foot infield single that matched New York state’s speed limit in most places of 55 mph.

“I forgot we even went to Baltimore,” Josh Lowe said and he was making that comment after a memorable trip that saw him homer and drove in five in a run of the mill rout of the Yankees.

The Rays hardly forgot what got them the 13 straight wins to open things and headed back home with a 19-13 record since their sparkling start and 12-10 since blazing to a 20-3 start. Of those losses, six are by one run with a reliever taking the loss in each time.

“We were close a couple, but close doesn’t necessarily cut it,” Rays manager Kevin Cash said after a trip when he saw Draw Rasmussen go down with a flexor strain in his right elbow and ace Shane McClanahan fail to protect a six-run lead.

And the Rays were beaten by two of their former players, watching former catcher Michael Perez throw out Harold Ramirez on a stole base try and former outfielder Tommy Pham get the decisive hit. Pham spent 184 games with the Rays in 2018 and 2019 but was so slumping drastically before getting the favorable set of inches to keep the ball fair.

With the expanded playoff field, the Rays struggled at times against teams they think highly of anticipate will be in the postseason. They lost a series to the 28-16 Orioles, who are now 3 1/2 out, then split the Yankees, who seemingly are finding their footing and then to the Mets, who are hoping this begins their path away from losing performances into some semblance of the 100-win team from last season when they held first place until the very end.

“We played three really good teams,” Josh Lowe said. “All three of those teams are going to finish probably in the postseason, I would imagine. Teams we’re playing right now are playing good. You just keep moving on.”

And for the Rays that means a return trip to their own beds and a return to relative health following a few nagging injuries such as the neck spasms by Wander Franco in a 2-for-22 slump and the groin injury Yandy Diaz sustained overrunning third base long before Jose Siri held on to Aaron Judge’s flyball and made Jason Adam tap his heart and exhale.

Now the Rays can exhale after their relatively easy travel trip but lengthy one that featured four of the best games seen involving a New York team within the first 45 or so games to date.