The Braves closed the gap with the first place Mets to 2.5 games as they held on for a 4-1 victory Saturday evening in Cincinnati.
Spencer Strider had his best start so far. He carried a no-hitter into the 5th. The lone run he gave up came as a result of a HBP of Kyle Farmer in the left hand (who left the game afterwards), a wild pitch, and a bloop single which ended up being the only run he surrendered. Strider ended up pitching 6 innings, allowing just the 1 run on 1 hit, 1 walk, and 11 strikeouts. Simply put, he was electric.
The Braves got on the board first in the 2ndinning, as Austin Riley led off with his 20thhomer. Reds starter Tyler Mahle walked the next 2 hitters and hit Adam Duvall on the hand with a fastball. But on a 3-1 pitch, Orlando Arcia checked his swing on a ball outside of the zone, and on an appeal it was ruled as a swing. Unfortunately, Duvall had a lapse of concentration, and started jogging to 2nd base thinking it was a walk. The pitcher simply threw the ball to first, and Mike Moustakas tagged Duvall out, who still didn’t realize that it was a strike. Arcia then struck out on the next pitch for the 2nd out, and the next hitter Michael Harris also struck out. The Braves managed to load the bases with 0 outs and didn’t score outside of the leadoff homer.
Duvall later left the game due to being injured on the HBP. No word on his condition to this point.
The Braves added a run in the 4th inning as Mahle struggled with his control and walked in a run. In the 7th, the Braves made it 4-1 after a Ronald Acuna Jr. walk, a Dansby Swanson single, a Matt Olson fielder’s choice for an RBI, and a Riley double for another RBI.
AJ Minter and Jesse Chavez pitched scoreless innings in the 7th and 8th, respectively.
Will Smith nearly blew the game in the 9th. After striking out Brandon Drury to lead off the inning, he walked the next 2 hitters. Matt Reynolds (who replaced an injured Farmer) flew out to right, but Hancock hit pinch hitter Donovan Solano with a back foot slider on an 0-2 pitch to load the bases. On the next pitch, Nick Senzel nearly hit a would be walk off grand slam, but the fastball was just in on him enough to where Guillermo Heredia caught it at the warning track for the 3rd out. Way too close.
The Braves will go for the sweep of the Reds tomorrow, as Charlie Morton faces Luis Castillo at 1:40 tomorrow.
So, you’re saying that this was a game that Chip explained how baseball is a game of inches?
I look forward to Alex landing Correa and deGrom this winter.
I can’t link right now but it’s already being reported we are the favorite for deGrom in the off-season.
Luis De Avila threw a 7-inning no-hitter last night for Rome.
And Matzek seems ready, striking out 3 needing 11 pitches.
@3 – Two things about the story about landing Degrom. First, the article appears to be nothing more than speculation. There is nothing that appears to corroborate it. Second, a Degrom deal would have to fully acknowledge his injury risk. He’s an otherworldly talent, but talent like that won’t do much good if he is constantly on the IL, which has been the case for a while.
Someone over at Battery Power posted this Pitching Ninja interview with Spencer Strider – uploaded today.
6 — Yeah, that’s my concern. I don’t want the Braves using over 30 million of the payroll on a guy who spends more time than not on the IL. And he’s not getting younger.
Methinks deGrom wants a new deal sooner rather than later (to shortcut the opt-out) and deGrom’s camp is using Olney as a way to turn up the heat on Cohen.
I’d rather give $30MM a year to Fried.
DeGrom’s from DeLand, so I’m sure he knows Chipper and his dad, and I also doubt that buys us more than a Big Gulp’s worth of home town discount.
@9, that sure sounds good to me.
@7. Thanks Timo! Fascinating. Thoroughly enjoyed watching that Strider interview. He’s a thoughtful, intelligent, mature and personable young man. Makes me want to root for him even harder.
Looks like we got June Chuck today.
The Peacock game of the week (Royals-Tigers) is currently airing with only the sounds of the stadium – no announcers. Watched for a few minutes before joining the Braves game. Considering going back and just following the Braves on gametracker. [Write your own Chip joke here, I can’t choose just one.]
Acuna is attempting the stolen base at the highest frequency of his career. At a good 78% success rate. I may have missed it being discussed here already but I wonder if some of Dansby’s offensive surge this year can be attributed to having Acuna on base in front of him and the distraction and pitch selection affected thusly.
@14
A lot of them seem to be hit-and-runs. Or possibly there’s just an understanding among everybody involved that Ronald has the green light for the most part and Dansby has the option to swing on those plays for the most part and whatever happens happens…I’m not sure it’s explicitly Snitker saying, “I’m going to hit-and-run here” every time that it happens.
OK, this has gotten officially interesting…
BTW, this is the free game today on MLB.tv.
Man. The pitching this weekend has been something else.
“Mano vs. Mano” I guess is a little like the old Mad Magazine “Spy vs. Spy”
And while I’m at it, we’ve gotten two “buzzing the towers” neither of which was anywhere near anyone’s head and one of which nearly hit Olson in the shin.
And please… could we stop with the “nothing to eliminate” trope? OK… I’m done for now.
I continue to be convinced that we’ll never see another Braves no-hitter. Of course, I was also convinced that we’d never see another Braves championship, so…
OK, Charlie… that’s that.
FWIW, that deGrom story seems a little dubious to me. Seems to me that, if he’s healthy enough to pitch with effectiveness, the Mets will re-sign him at a number that’ll make him happy. It’s not like they can’t afford to overpay him.
And if he isn’t 100%, why in the world would we want him?
If he ever signed with the Braves, IMO, it’ll be because he specifically wants to be a Brave.
If I’m the Mets, with the 3 wild card positions giving them a good chance of making the postseason even if they don’t win the division, I’d be tempted to have deGrom pitch three-inning stints every five days just to keep his arm loose for the rest of the regular season and increase the likelihood that he’ll be healthy for the postseason. Or maybe alternate between three and six innings so he’s used to going six occasionally.
McUgh.
McPuke has given up more hits in 1/3 of an inning than Strider and Morton in a combined 15 innings. Lollipops aren’t playing today for him
Morton may not know how to “win,” but McHugh is an expert in “losing.”
Fire Snitker into the sun with McHugh. Belt high and 88 gets hit in high school.
I wish this would lead to a DFA but he is one on Snit’s guys and “just had a tough day”.
McHugh hanging pitches in middle of zone ….was Minter not available ?? This McHugh guy is do hittable
Obviously, the absences of Jansen, Matzek and Jackson leave you in a pickle, but McUgh and his sub-90 pitches shouldn’t be anywhere near a high-leverage situation.
fart noise
Well, as the poor soul tasked with recapping this, at least not a whole lot happened in this game to make it an arduous recap.
That’s why we need a power arm in bullpen .. hello … perfect spot for Strider .. yea he has pitched great as a starter but he would be lights out in these situations
3 straight hits to tie the game…sure, leave him in. This dude needs to go. Couldn’t have gotten one more inning from Morton, and go to Minter for the 9th?
Why not Lee? He is actually an effective pitcher. If Chavez and Minter were unavailable Lee would have been a better choice. 88/89 and up aren’t going to work
Say what you want about McHugh but 1 run is not gonna win many games.
Is Minter unable to work back to back days?
With that homer, Ozuna has finally reached the .700 OPS plateau.
McHugh has been great since coming back from COVID, and is currently our best righty out of the bullpen. (And no, that doesn’t mean it would be a good idea to move Strider back there right now.)
Ben Ingram: “Mike Ford is in the on-deck circle.”
But why?
HARRIS
Is that a rookie of the year or WHAT?
@28 – We’re going to play 18 lol.
@36: Because he had to pitch on Thursday. The deal is that you get to hit every once in awhile.
A more complicated but perhaps much more enjoyable recap!!!
MICHAEL
Braves bench sucks … Heredia and Ford are useless … we could do so much better .. Harris with a bomb .. hopefully Snit don’t roll McHugh back out ….
Who said that he can’t pull the ball with authority? Yowza!
MICHAEL HARRIS I LOVE YOU
That was absolutely murdered.
Isn’t Chip going to say that “With that popout, McHugh is no longer eligible to get the Win.”?
Michael Harris ll needs a nickname. I vote for Sequel.
Please keep telling me about Olson’s great defense. Dude is just this side of Klesko
Nice throw.
Ozuna needs to take that…his defense has hurt us several times before so no surprise
That was Ozuna’s ball. Every time he plays the field he screws up.
How about you call everybody off and make a damned play, Ozuna?
Lol, it doesn’t matter, but they gave Dansby the error.
We just can’t get a good relief performance.
Jesus, an error, walk, and HBP. What a disaster.
So AJ wasn’t the answer either
Bloody hell. Night shift, day s**t.
Need a right handed power arm and some type of bench. Too many useless players among Heredia and Ford. Might as well let Fried hit instead of either of them
What happened with the error? Gameday is unhelpful.
59 — Minter picked off Pham, who ran to 2nd but Olson made a low throw that Dansby had to reach back for. He got a glove on it but couldn’t secure the catch for the tag.
Then Votto hit a foul ball that landed in play between 3 fielders. Riley and Dansby were turned away from the plate and had bad angles, while Ozuna had time to get there and could have called them off. He may have lost it in the sun.
2 plays beat us … the Pham pick off and letting Votto ball drop … enough said ..
Whole lotta barf the last 2 innings on the pitching/defense side. And the Mets just won their game too. Blghh.
If I may sum today’s fiasco up please.
One walk.
Three SOLO homers.
And a manager with his head up his ass.
Thank you.
P S Arcia will be at 200 or less by the end of July.
Recapped
A vote please. Who has the greater baseball knowledge?
Uncle Tupelo lead by Jeff Tweety
The Atlanta Braves lead by no one.