The Braves came from behind in extra innings to beat the Astros and pick up a half game on the Mets.
Spencer Strider and Cristian Javier had a great pitching duel for 6 innings. The only runs each of them gave up were solo homers, Jeremy Pena for the Astros, and Vaughn Grissom for the Braves. The bullpens also shut down the offenses for the remainder of regulation.
Dylan Lee pitched the tenth for the Braves, and Houston was able to string together 3 hits including a double, scoring the Manfred man and an insurance run as well. The Braves were able to rally in the bottom of the tenth, as Michael Harris doubled in the Manfred runner, then Robbie Grossman was able to knock in Harris to tie the game.
The Astros scored the Manfred man again in the eleventh on a ground ball single through the infield and an infield hit. In the bottom of the inning, Austin Riley drew a leadoff walk. Matt Olson then hit a check swing grounder that went against the shift and turned into a double, scoring the Manfred man and putting Riley at third base and Olson at second base. With nobody out, William Contreras was walked to put a force play at any base. Travis D’Arnaud pinch hit for Heredia (who had pinch run for the DH Rosario earlier) and hit a ground ball single to right through the drawn in infield, scoring the winning run.
The Braves go for the sweep of the Astros today as Charlie Morton matches up against Jose Urquidy this afternoon.
For being irrelevant for the better part of a decade, Mets fans sure are cocky about their success this year. It took us four years to grab the trophy. Maybe hold off on buying parade tickets.
Ozuna in the lineup and the OF today. Gross on many levels, the least important of which is that he sucks at baseball.
Altuve out with shoulder soreness.
Great recap, thanks. A minor correction, Houston scored the Manfred Man in the 11th without benefit of a hit. After he advanced to third on a ground out to short, he scored on a weak bouncer to third where Riley made an excellent play to get the runner at 1st.
Another poor call on that strikeout to Grissom. He laid off some tough pitches before that one.
Haven’t heard the Braves crowd boo a Braves player in the past few years until today.
I’ve said it before, but I’m pretty content with Backup Plan playing 1B. Would I rather have Freddy? Sure. But AA sure came through on this one.
“Here’s Ozuna from the Braves.”
– Ben Ingram
Lmao he went there.
Ben Ingram with the troll… “Now here is Ozuna from the Braves.”
2 is true. Scum bag in left field. Just what we need, a player with zero offense and defense skills. Hopefully he will hit a H R.
Maybe the Braves are show casing his skills to a potential suitor.
Katrine Engberd The Tenant
Danish writer. Story takes place in one of my favorite cities, Copenhagen.
Let’s enjoy the game.
Aside from Ozuna this has been a very enjoyable game. Morton is in playoff shape, new 1B launched one into orbit. This last play, less enjoyable.
Stop the episode, Chuck.
Charlie’s having an Episode.
Morton having an episode. Seems to get gun shy with runners on base
The pitches to Gurriel were so bad it looked like an unintentional intentional walk. Of course Alvarez made him pay for that.
Can we please stop sending Acuña from first?
Acuna was so good stealing earlier in the year…
A lot of curveballs low out of the zone to Harris lately. We’ll see how quickly he can adjust.
Ozuna at bats are sucking the energy out of the stadium.
Do we ever get a hit when swinging 3-0?
Heredia in left wouldn’t have been worse than Ozuna
What is Rileys avg since he signed the big contract Aug 1 ??? .200 ?? 2 hr’s and maybe 10 rbi ?
Why would Snitker bring in a lefty in Matzek when he RH hitters coming up in inning .. ??.duh
What a strange lineup we have with our outfielders batting 7-8-9…
@22–you’ve asserted repeatedly that Riley’s contract extension has somehow caused him to cool off offensively. It’s true that he had a historically great July; he has not measured up in August to those incredible numbers, but that is not surprising . There is no basis to conclude the contract extension has caused him to “relax” or not try as hard or the like. Austin is just fine.
Braves fixed Robbie Grossman in matter of days; Tigers couldn’t all season
https://www.detroitnews.com/story/sports/mlb/tigers/2022/08/20/braves-fixed-robbie-grossman-matter-days-tigers-couldnt-all-season/7855603001/
@25. That’s after two months of insisting that Spencer Strider needs to be in the bullpen. He’ll move on to his next ridiculous thing in a few weeks, then post about it twice daily.
Is Matzek only allowed to pitch one inning .. Lee is over worked .. been struggling …not a place to bring him in .. could have went Matzek for 1st guy …then went righty
High leverage Dylan Lee. Again.
@28 agree with you 100%
Lee was not the right choice. And has complained about being overworked.
Oh well, 2/3 from the team with the best record in MLB is still good.
The offense worries me more, it’s sputtering by, even winning 11 out of 13 games.
Without Grissom they probably lose a couple of those, if not more.
Acuna looks at an awful lot of third strikes these days.
So again we punt with Stephens and then score in the ninth. How many more times?
Again Snit’s bullpen management bites us in the ass. Makes me wonder who pulled the strings in the playoffs
@32 Took the words right outta my mouth. Second time we could have salvaged a game with a clean top of the 9th.
Down 2, shoulda used Jansen. Or Gene Garber.
Michael Harris hitting .188 since signing contract … a terrible trend here with him and Riley ..
Great week. Could have easily won 7.
Joe Madden is available.
Slumps and contract signing have nothing to do with each other. Nothing.
Did you expect both to continue to perform as they had been? Of course you didn’t. Unless you are not one who recognizes reality.
Please wait until 162, than give your performance thoughts. One thing can be agreed upon now, Qzuna is an embarrassment, twenty four hours a day.
Let’s have a good road trip.
Defense will be the Phillies undoing.
I reverse my thinking, Mets can be caught.
Snit will make it challenging.
Breaking news: Austin Riley and Michael Harris are not .400 hitters. Jury still out on Vaughn Grissom though.
@23, last year and this year Matzek has been much better against RHB than against LHB, in a total of 236 PA vs. RHB and 147 against LHB before today. That’s not a lot of PA to base a conclusion on, but you could add in some from last year’s postseason, where I remember him not looking overmatched against Dodger RHBs like Pujols, Souza, and Betts. He was better against LHB in 2020, but by less than his margin in the opposite direction over the last two years. It seems reasonable to conclude that even if he might not really be better against RHB, he probably doesn’t have nearly as much of a disadvantage against them as most LHPs do.
Useless Phillies
@32 With how good they were, it didn’t matter.
From that bullpen, Matzek has taken a step back, Smith is gone, and Jackson is injured.
Spencer Strider, on why the Braves rookies have felt comfortable this year:
https://theathletic.com/3526817/2022/08/21/braves-rookies-michael-harris-ii-spencer-strider-vaughn-grissom/
Recapped