ATLANTA -- David Wright was going to attend Georgia Tech and study architecture if he wasn't drafted. He had visited Atlanta and, his words, "fallen in love with the city." Cliff Floyd and Mike Cameron knew the city from their days with other National League teams, and they liked it, too. And other Mets say they have nothing against the city -- Peachtree this and Peachtree that.

But they'll learn. They'll come to dread the 404 area code and the baseball stadium in it. They'll learn to hate the city -- professionally, if not personally. They'll come to think of the playing surface of Turner Field as quicksand and the ballpark itself as, in the 1998 words of Mike Piazza, "Death Valley for us."

The personnel changes, the story line changes, the outlook changes, too. But for the Mets in this city, the song remains the same. They play, they come up on the wrong side of the final score. They played Tuesday, they lost Tuesday, 4-0.

Bothered by the loss Monday and still smarting from the Yankees series, the Mets strangled their bats, trying to squeeze some offense from them. Instead, they were shut out. It was a nothing night in the ballpark that has been something for them.

They have lost 24 times in their last 31 games here. Those numbers yield a .226 winning percentage and enough heartache to fill the Georgia Dome five or six times. And those figures say nothing of how the Mets chances to play in the postseason died here in 1998 and 2001 and how their postseason ended here in 1999.

"I'm not sure what went on before I came over," Mike Cameron said. "But I'm pretty sure it wasn't real good. Since I've been here, we've stunk it up. We're the whipping boys when we come here."

The Mets' startling inability to beat the Braves at Turner Field is surpassed, it seems, only by the inability of Tom Glavine to beat the Braves anywhere. Glavine was the losing pitcher Tuesday, defeated for the eighth time in his nine starts against his former team.

Pitching with five days' rest -- one more than he usually prefers -- he limited the Braves to four hits and one run in six innings. But Hudson was more successful -- if no more effective. The Braves scored three times in the seventh to secure their sixth victory in eight games against the Mets this season. The Mets have lost four of their last five games overall, four of five games at Turner Field this season and 14 of 21 road games this season.

Hudson (5-3) was pitching on three days' rest for the first time in his career other than in the postseason. And his 193rd career start was his first against the Mets. He experienced some resistance early; the Mets had two baserunners in each of the first three innings. But they were hitless in six at-bats with runners in scoring position. They had no other runners in scoring position thereafter.

"He's one of those pitchers ... you have to get him early before he settles in," Willie Randolph said. "You don't look at one inning and say, 'That's why we lost or won.' But it would have been easier if we scored early."

Or if they scored at all.

Hudson allowed only two baserunners over the subsequent five innings, as he retired the Mets on 46 pitches, including six in the 1-2-3 fifth inning.

With almost no rest between half-innings, Glavine allowed the Braves' first run in the fifth. Raul Modesi bunted for a leadoff base hit. A single to right by Johnny Estrada immediately followed and moved Mondesi to second. Glavine retired Wilson Betemit, but Ryan Langerhans, hitless in his previous 20 at-bats, singled just past second baseman Miguel Cairo for the run.

Tom Glavine  /   P
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There might have bee more damage, but Glavine made a brilliant play on Hudson's attempted squeeze bunt on the next play, barehanding the bunt on a dive and flipping it to Piazza quickly enough that the Mets catcher could tag Estrada. Glavine rolled on is left (glove) wrist and injured the first knuckle on his middle finger. He may have the hand X-rayed Wednesday. But Glavine said he was certain the problem will not prevent him from pitching.

The Mets went down in order in the seventh, on seven pitches, and Glavine, who made the third out, was back on the mound with, essentially, no rest. But his work day was about to end. He allowed a leadoff infield single to Mondesi. Estrada's double down the left-field line scored the second run. After a sacrifice and a walk to Langerhans, Hudson drove in a run with a ground ball that Wright initially misplayed.

Moving to his left, Wright would have had a difficult throw to the plate. He dropped the ball and threw out Hudson as Estrada scored. Rafael Furcal then ended Glavine's night -- and, for all intents and purposes -- the Mets chances with a run-scoring triple.

"I thought I made two bad pitches the whole night," Glavine said. "One on Estrada's first hit and Furcal's triple. ... I can't be upset. It's as good a game as I've pitched all year. The results stink. But the last four times out, I've been comfortable and feel good about them."

Glavine was gone after 6 2/3 innings, having allowed seven hits and a walk. Had the Mets scored early, who knows? But this is Turner Field. And seldom does anything go well for a Mets player here, even one who, for a long time, helped create the Mets' misery. But Turner has gotten to even Glavine. His career record here is 49-27, but with the Mets he has lost five of six decisions in the South.

"I still like the ballpark," he said last week. "But I think I used to like it more."