Atlanta’s Fried outduels Mets’ deGrom

ATLANTA — Round one of this weekend’s heavyweight bout, a 5-2 Mets loss to Atlanta, started as a showdown of ace versus ace but evolved into a showcase of the teams’ wildly different approaches to scoring — a potentially relevant development with the pitching-dominant environment of the postseason looming.

The Mets, with a pass-the-baton, string-hits-together kind of lineup that features one true slugger, scored first in the second inning when they put together three quick singles, two of which might have been outs if not for leftfielder Eddie Rosario’s defensive flubs.

They didn’t mount any other true scoring threats until the ninth, when they loaded the bases with one out but failed to do anything else.

Atlanta, by virtue of its prolific power, is almost always a scoring threat. It hit three solo home runs — including back-to-back shots from Austin Riley and Matt Olson in the bottom of the second — in six innings against Jacob deGrom and used more hard-hit extra-base hits later to open up a more comfortable lead.

The series opener put the Mets and Atlanta back into a tie atop the NL East with five games to go, including the next two against each other.

“You’re seeing two teams that have some different skill sets but you still get to the same end game,” manager Buck Showalter said. “They just pitched a little better than we did tonight.”

Home runs were the difference. Atlanta’s 237 on the season are second in the majors (behind the Yankees’ 244). The Mets rank 16th with 162, right between such non-contenders as the Diamondbacks and Reds.

For most of the year, the Mets’ offensive philosophy of balance and contact has worked plenty. Against lefthander Max Fried and a slew of relievers Friday night, it did not.

Fried gave up one run and four hits, all singles, in five innings before exiting because he felt ill. He struck out three and walked none on the way to lowering his ERA to 2.48.

Collin McHugh, Raisel Iglesias and Kenley Jansen tossed scoreless innings; A.J. Minter allowed a solo shot to Tomas Nido.

DeGrom was ultimately less successful than Fried but still struck out 11 and walked none.

When Rosario went down swinging in the fifth, deGrom collected the 100th strikeout of his much-abbreviated season. He got there in 63 innings. The last of the five hits against him was a long ball from Dansby Swanson in the sixth.

Atlanta’s blasts were absolutely blasted, too. Riley’s tying homer went 422 feet to center. Olson’s go-ahead homer went 430 to right-center. Swanson’s tack-on homer went 441 to left-center.

“That’s a good lineup over there. You gotta eliminate mistakes, which I did not do tonight,” said deGrom, who exited after 86 pitches because of a blister on his right middle finger. “That’s what happens. I left balls over the middle of the plate and they did damage. 

“The ones to Riley and Olson were right down the middle. Those were terrible pitches.”

DeGrom has a 6.00 ERA in his past four starts. He has yielded six long balls in that stretch after allowing three total in his first seven outings. The strikeouts have continued to come in bunches — 39 in 21 innings — but has allowed at least three earned runs in each of those games.

As the first man out of the bullpen, Tylor Megill — among those auditioning for a relief job in the playoffs — faced Atlanta’s bottom five batters in the order and gave up four hard-hit balls. Three of them were hits. Two of those were doubles. Two runs scored.

Joely Rodriguez retired all three batters he faced in the eighth. Five of his past six appearances have been scoreless, bringing his ERA down to 4.69.

Francisco Alvarez, the Mets’ top prospect, went 0-for-4 in his major-league debut. He grounded into a double play in his first at-bat, grounded out again in his second, flied out to center in his third and — representing the potential go-ahead run with the bases loaded and one out — struck out in his last, his bat flying to the backstop on the whiff.