Mandatory Credit: Jasen Vinlove-USA TODAY Sports

Not much went right for the New York Mets in their series-opening 6-3 loss to the Miami Marlins on Monday night at IoanDepot Park.

Rookie right-hander Tylor Megill suffered the first poor outing of his young big league career. He put the Mets in an early 4-0 hole, as he allowed a grand slam to Lewis Brinson before retiring a single out in the bottom of the first.

Luckily Megill was able to settle down after that, and allowed five runs over five tough innings of work. Unfortunately, the struggling Mets offense was unable to pick the youngster up this time around.

The Mets mustered just three runs on seven hits, and squandered a handful of opportunities to continue chipping away at the Marlins lead. One of the lone bright spots for the Mets came off the bat of big Pete Alonso.

After the Mets scratched across two in the top of the second, Alonso led off the top of the third cracking a Jesus Luzardo sinker over the left-field fence to make it a 4-3 ballgame. He added an infield single later in the game for his second hit of the night.

For Alonso, it was his 24th home run of the season, and his seventh in 18 games since the All-Star break. The big man said postgame on Monday that his recent power surge is a result of him being more comfortable in the box.

“I just think that I’ve been really really comfortable. I’ve been seeing the ball well and my body’s been feeling great. Thankfully I’ve been healthy since coming off the IL. I feel like I’m in a groove, and I’ve just been capitalizing on a lot of pitches in the zone,” Alonso said.

With the loss, the Mets have dropped four of their last five, and have scored three runs or fewer in seven of their last nine games. As a result, they’ve seen their lead in the NL East shrink to just 2.5 games over the Philadelphia Phillies.

Despite the struggles, Alonso said the team is just going through a tough little rut, and there are no long-term concerns at the plate.

“It’s been a hard-fought season. It’s not for a lack of effort, it’s not for a lack of passion or professionalism. It’s just baseball. It’s unfortunate, but we have 60 games to go, we have a ton of baseball left. It’s going to be fun coming down the stretch,” the slugger said.

Alonso and the Mets will look to turn things around and get back to their winning ways with right-hander Taijuan Walker on the mound against the Marlins on Tuesday night.