Mets Lose to Braves, Putting End to 3-Game Winning Streak

ATLANTA — Freddie Freeman hit a go-ahead R.B.I. single in the second inning, Ronald Acuna Jr. had his fifth straight multihit game, and the Atlanta Braves snapped the Mets’ three-game winning streak with an 11-7 victory Saturday night.

Dansby Swanson drove in three runs, and Acuna, Nick Markakis and Johan Camargo each added two R.B.I. Josh Donaldson went 2 for 3 and hit his first home run with the Braves in the seventh.

Touki Toussaint, recalled from Class AAA Gwinnett earlier in the day, earned the win with six strong innings of relief. He allowed four hits, one unearned run and two walks with seven strikeouts.

Acuna, last season’s National League Rookie of the Year, is hitting .579 with seven runs, three homers and eight R.B.I. over his last five games. Freeman began the day leading the league in on-base percentage; he has reached safely in Atlanta’s first 14 games.

The Braves went ahead, 8-4, in the second off reliever Corey Oswalt on R.B.I. by Freeman, Acuna, Markakis and Swanson. Markakis’s first home run of the season made it 9-4 in the fourth. Oswalt allowed six hits and five runs in three and two-thirds innings.

The Mets tied the score at 4-4 in the second as Braves starter Sean Newcomb loaded the bases. Juan Lagares followed with a two-run double, Oswalt had a sacrifice fly, and Jeff McNeil drove in two with a single. Toussaint took Newcomb’s place after the left-hander allowed five hits, four runs and two walks in one and a third innings.

Mets starter Jason Vargas was worse, lasting just six batters and 36 pitches. He gave up Acuna’s R.B.I. single and was chased on Swanson’s bases-loaded walk. Vargas allowed two hits, four runs and three walks in one-third of an inning. Mets Manager Mickey Callaway was not far behind Vargas, being ejected by the end of the first.

SURGERY FOR DARLING Ron Darling, a longtime analyst on the Mets’ broadcasts and a former pitcher for the team, said during Saturday’s telecast on SNY that he would have surgery next week to remove a “large mass in my chest” and hoped to return to the booth in May.

Darling, 58, said a series of tests revealed the mass. He said doctors told him that “if there are no complications, I should be back on air talking baseball sometime next month.”

The Mets said that doctors had been monitoring Darling the past few months. The team added that the SNY studio analyst and former Mets player Todd Zeile will fill in for Darling during his medical leave.

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