None of that mattered once the bats got going. First pitch was 7:10 PM ET, and by the middle innings this had stopped being a pitchers' duel and turned into exactly the kind of laugher that makes a division race feel a lot less pressing for one night.
Ozzie Albies actually got Atlanta on the board early and later tied it with a two-run homer off Pérez's relief, Connor Thomas, but Marcus Semien answered right back with a two-run shot of his own to put the Mets ahead for good. Thornton settled in from there, working into the 7th before departing having allowed 3 runs on 6 hits with 5 strikeouts — hardly his sharpest, but plenty good enough. Behind him, the Mets bullpen and lineup buried Atlanta with 19 hits and a five-spot in the 7th, then five more in the 8th to turn a competitive game into a rout.
For the Braves, this is the kind of loss a 62-44 club with a division cushion can absorb without much panic — Atlanta's still comfortably in first and getting healthier by the week. For the Mets, buried under .500 at 45-62, this is just about all that's left: play spoiler, develop arms like Thornton, and make life miserable for whoever's chasing a pennant. On night 1 of this series, they did exactly that.
It's a reminder that even bad teams beat good teams plenty in a 162-game season — the Braves just found that out the hard way, and Thornton's turning into a legitimate reason to watch a Mets game that otherwise means nothing in the standings.