NEW YORK -- From the start with Buck Showalter’s Mets, you have heard about “all 26,” which means all 26 of their players. Now, with rosters slightly expanded in September, the number is 28 when it’s not a doubleheader day. So the number has changed, just not the big idea about the season the Mets are having, and the way they all keep pulling on the rope together.

It was never more evident than when they were just taking two out of three from the Dodgers, who came into Citi Field with the best record in baseball, by a lot, and left it the same way. As close and exciting as the three games were -- and there was a playoff sound and feel to the ballpark starting Tuesday night -- the Dodgers aren’t being chased by anybody the way the Mets are being chased by the Braves. Atlanta has been playing as well as anybody for months and show no signs of stopping, and is going to keep chasing the Mets unless the Mets end up chasing them.

But you cannot have watched these games, and they really were something to see, every one, without walking away from them thinking this:

The sides looked even, as the Mets seemed to come at them with everybody they had except Max Scherzer, who didn’t pitch against the Dodgers because he pitched last Sunday.

It was mentioned to Showalter long after the Mets had closed out Thursday’s 5-3 win because of a clean ninth from Adam Ottavino that I felt like at least 10 of his guys had something to do with winning this series, and their season series (four games to three) from Dave Roberts' team.

I started with Francisco Lindor, who’d looked so much like New York’s Mookie Betts on Thursday: at the plate with two hits, in the field with a dazzling pickup and backhand flip behind second base and a huge stolen base that helped the Mets go ahead, 3-2. When I’d randomly gone through my list, Showalter said, “You forgot Canha’s catch for Jake.”

And I had, from Wednesday night’s game in the top of the first with Jacob deGrom on the mound. Mark Canha made a sweet over-the-shoulder catch in left, one that did get lost a little bit because Brandon Nimmo made the defensive play of the Mets’ season later on, going back and then up and finally over the wall to take a home run away from an old Met named Justin Turner.

"Our guys hear me talk about posting up all the time,” Showalter said then. “I’m talking about going to the post every single day. Or being ready to go to the post if you’re coming off the bench. I did feel like they all just posted up about a really good team.”

The Dodgers are already looking ahead to the postseason, because they are a mortal lock to win the NL West and end up with the best record in the league. So there is more urgency with the Mets. It’s their constant state, but doesn’t change the way the two teams went at each other as hard as they did. Lindor hit and ran. Edwin Díaz, who even had Timmy Trumpet playing his walkup music in person on Wednesday, had a blow-away ninth inning and then a far more interesting one on Thursday, because Buck wanted him to go after the heart of the order. Díaz walked a batter and hit one and nearly gave up two home runs before throwing a 102.8 mph fastball past Gavin Lux to preserve a two-run lead.

Starling Marte beat out what looked like a routine grounder to Lux to start a two-run rally in the sixth. Lindor doubled him home. Later, Lindor stole third after Buck sent him, and he scored on a sacrifice fly by Darin Ruf. This was the day after deGrom, Ottavino and Diaz made Marte’s two-run homer stand up in a 2-1 win Wednesday night.

Chris Bassitt, a quiet star of Showalter’s staff behind Scherzer and deGrom, pitched six bulldog innings to get his 12th victory, and fifth in a row. Trevor May pitched a hitless seventh, and struck out two batters. Catcher James McCann, still only hitting .189 when Thursday’s game ended, had a double and scored when Nimmo’s bloop to short right fell in. Nimmo, hustling all the way because he always does, got to second. Marte singled him home, and the Mets had another run. They don’t steal games, not against a team as good as the Dodgers, but they have stolen runs like this all season long.

deGrom was routinely brilliant in his fifth start the night before, three hits, one run allowed (a Mookie homer), nine more strikeouts in seven innings (and throwing 93 pitches). Ottavino looked like the lockdown reliever he once was in Colorado. In the end, as well as the Dodgers hit, they got four runs in Tuesday’s win, one Wednesday, three on Thursday.

“It was nice to see that we could play with them,” Showalter said in his typically understated way.

The Mets already knew that. The Mets, all of them, know by now that they can play with anybody. The number of players on the active roster has expanded. So have their possibilities as they make the turn toward October.