Seven Phillies pitchers shut down the Braves on 5 hits to take a 1 – 0 lead in the NL Division Series. Bryce Harper scored an unearned run in the top of the 4th and hit a solo homer in the 6th to lead the Phillies offense.
Harper laid off a 2 – 2 slider before working a 2 out walk in the 4th, then took 2nd on an errant pickoff throw by Spencer Strider. Bryson Stott‘s single plated the game’s first run. Strider went 7 innings, allowing 5 hits and 2 walks, while striking out 8.
Philadelphia picked up their final run in the 8th. A.J. Minter allowed a 1 out single to Trea Turner, then walked Harper and was relieved by Pierce Johnson. Stott walked to load the bases, then J.T. Realmuto was awarded first on catcher’s interference to force in the run. The Phillies stole 5 bases, although none led directly to a run.
The Phillies went to the bullpen in the 4th after the Braves got a couple of runners on against Ranger Suarez with 2 out. Jeff Hoffman walked Marcell Ozuna to load the bases, but struck out Michael Harris II to end the inning. The Braves got the tying run to the plate with nobody out in the 8th, but Matt Olson flew out to left center then Turner started a terrific double play after a diving stop of an Ozzie Albies bullet to his left.
The Braves will aim to even the series on Monday before it heads up to Philadelphia. 6:07 Eastern is the game time; Max Fried and Zack Wheeler scheduled.
Starting to think the simulated games after the end of the regular season were a tad overhyped.
Following up on the catcher’s interference. Although the challenge replays didn’t show any angle of it, Justin Toscano reports that Murphy said that he thought he hit the bat,
Well I chose not to watch and I feel it was the right choice :/
Every single hitter in our lineup wants to be the dude that hit a dinger. Playoff baseball is about situational hitting and capitalizing on opportunities. We’re taking massive cuts behind in the count with runner on third and one out. Just awful. I don’t understand why we don’t have that grind-out-great-at-bats mentality, but we don’t. We either fix it, or we get swept.
https://www.mlb.com/news/home-runs-to-play-major-role-in-october
This article, although it’s from 2019, is chock full of good data indicating that the teams who outhomer their opponents have more success in both the regular season and the postseason. The Braves used their prodigious power to blast their way to 104 wins, an NL East division title, and a first-round playoff bye this year. It won’t always work because baseball is a crazy and random sport, but more often than not, the homer-centric approach will be what propels a team to victory in the postseason.
We need a Joc Pederson.
Tough loss but just a real great job by Phillies pitching.
Thinking of last season’s Mets series facing DeGrom and Scherzer. Odds were against the Braves. We beat them both to overtake the Mets on the last weekend of the season. Let’s do it again. Go Braves!
Game 1 – more crap than crapshoot
Yet in Max we trust
I took a walk around our neighborhood to cool off last night after the loss. The one word that keeps coming back to me this morning: Maturity.
We played like an immature ball club last night. Which is so weird. But, remember how we talked when FF5 and Dansby were gone. We naturally asked, who is the peer leader in the clubhouse? Obviously the coaching staff is very seasoned and very good. But who is the player that focuses this group when they need?
We are a young, super-talented core of players that are locked in to playing together for awhile. But when we get kicked in the teeth like last night – and like we really didn’t all season – who gets us back on track?
We played tight. Like we felt the pressure. And so we were pressing. Too much. Trying too hard to live up to the highest expectations. Arguably the greatest offense in history, record-setting and -tying, reduced to a handful of singles and zero HR’s. Unthinkable!
We weren’t ourselves. We played like we were overcome by the pressure. We played like we weren’t accustomed to that moment and didn’t know how to handle the expectations. Like we lacked…Maturity. We’re one game down, but we already have to look in the mirror and remind ourselves who we are and what we are capable of. Not just because it’s 0-1, but because of the WAY we got here.
So who is the Mirror in the clubhouse? Who sets the tone? Who rattles the cages? Can it be Snit? I really don’t know. We’re 163 games into the season, and I can’t say for sure who our leaders are. Kind of scary.
I appreciate the urge to come up with psychological or sociological or strategic explanations for the unexpected result last night. Being shutout for the first time in ages, after having a historically great offensive season, was so unexpected we assume there must be some rational explanation. But the truth is the playoffs really are a crapshoot. Sometimes you come up empty. The good news is that last night’s game has little if any predictive value for the rest of the series.
EDIT—that’s not to deny for a minute that the team may need to be reminded that they are an excellent offensive team and that there is no need to press. But Snit strikes me as exactly that kind of leader.
It’s kind of hard to argue that Freddie and Dansby are or ever were the magic missing playoff chemistry ingredients. For all we know, it may well be the exact opposite: Dansby’s not-untalented team just choked away a playoff spot to the Marlins, and Freddie’s very talented team didn’t fare too well last night (or last NLDS) either.
I’m not going to pretend I have any great insight into the chicken-and-egg problem of “Do the right vibes lead to good ABs, or do good ABs create the right vibes?” To whatever extent that is the most helpful way for the players to think about the problem — and I doubt that it is — if there is no clubhouse personality to make the team relax more/focus more/have more swagger/whatever, then there’s nothing for it but to make the best gameplan you can to face Wheeler, execute it and hope it works.
I think it has more to do that virtually every pitcher the Phillies brought in last night was throwing 100 on the black.
The Braves have lost 59 times this season, and there is a good chance it will happen again.
And if they lose seven more they could be world champions!
Changing the lineup kinda bothers me. Taking out Strider kinda bothers me (to go to Minter!!??). Choking in game 1 of nearly every postseason appearance really bothers me. That’s way beyond crapshoot outcomes.
Told ya. Postseason over and the Phillies will be on the WS this year. Enjoy watching Braves!
Long time lurker, but here is my $.02: I went to the Nationals/Braves game on 9/29 at Truist and left pretty much assuming the Braves will lose in the first round of the postseason. This nonsense of taking your foot of the brake, resting starters, and evaluating bench players as you enter playoffs is a recipe for disaster, and hot MLB teams have been falling into that trap for 2+ decades. They should have kept every starter in and played to beat the Nationals. Period. Who cares about Wall, Williams, Pillar, and Lopez? Who cares? They’re not going to carry us to the World Series. Keep Olson in the game. Keep Acuna in the game. Start Harris. You’re playing a garbage team, in front of a sold-out crowd on a Friday night, the playoffs are days away, so play to win! Be upset if you do not win. It’s very important! Keep that killer instinct and never allow a losing mindsight to enter your consciousness. We are watching the exact same thing unfold that happened last year. The Braves look lackadaisical and the Philles are on fire. I really hope I’m wrong, but I don’t think I am. Hopefully we don’t win the NL East next season because the Braves don’t know how to manage accordingly. Looks like only the Astros know how to do it. This is so frustrating to watch. And that Sunday October 1 loss to the Nat was hideous, too! This is Moneyball 2.0 (challenging the conventional MLB wisdom): stop cruising into the playoffs. Play to win every game. Period.
The difference is that Moneyball 1.0 was based on evidence, not gut-level assertions.
No- a shutout loss at home is not a gut-level assertation. That actually happened. Losing to the Phillies in four games last year is not a gut-level assertation. That really happened. The Braves looked lackadaisical at the end of the season vs the Nationals. They looked lackadaisical last night. The Phillies are the complete opposite. Winning is contagious. Losing is contagious. It’s very difficult to turn it on and off, especially in professional baseball where it’s all about timing. Unfortunately, the Braves are finding this out the hard way. Again. I saw this at the 9/29 game, and it was really reinforced on the last game of the season. Just playing random players, fooling around, not concerned about winning. Apparently, that’s what the brightest minds in baseball think you’re supposed to do when you win your division by a few games. (I do not think it’s a good idea and it’s nauseating to watch)
To be fair, the Phillies also beat the Braves five times during the season.
All the pessimism after a first game loss is pretty amusing. I’m not happy about it and there are some concerns, but I’m not ready to fhrow in the towel just yet. With Wright and Morton out, it highlights the need for a breakthrough performance from Elder and/or Smith Shawver.
I think the Phillies had a good game plan that only works if you have a good bullpen and plenty of time between games. Pull the starter at the first sign that Atlanta may be figuring him out and have a very short leash on every reliever. Hopefully we have a strong first inning today that spoils that strategy.
Maybe we can get all the people who think the Braves are lackadaisical and all the people who think the Braves are pressing to all go into one big room and not come out until the debate is finally settled.
Yeah, but then we’d get the “Snit hit Riley second” faction.
Earlier this season, Matt Olson was moved down in the order and, apparently, responded by striking out less/hitting for a higher average while also hitting for tremendous power. That’s the prevailing narrative, at least.
Humans are pattern-seeking, meaning-making creatures. Baseball fans are humans who become emotionally invested in a game they generally don’t understand very deeply–at least, not at the level a professional scout or player understands it. Baseball fans are also conditioned by broadcasters to turn baseball games and seasons into morality plays because the broadcaster’s goal is to draw the biggest audience, not to enlighten fans as much as possible. And broadcasters know what works to draw a big audience.
One broadcaster did mention in passing that, right around the time Olson was dropped in the order, Ozuna pointed out to Olson that he was doing something dumb with his hands. I don’t even remember what it was anymore; I think he was loading too high. My point is, it was not the kind of thing any of us would ever notice. Of course, Olson made the adjustment, it produced results right away, and from there, he ended up setting a couple Braves single-season offensive records.
This is not to say that being moved down didn’t have some impact on Olson–positive or negative, who really knows. Or that Joc Pederson didn’t make a big positive difference to the 2021 team, or whatever.
It’s meant to be a reminder that there are a million complex mechanical things going on on a baseball field at any given time during a game, most of which we laypeople never discern, let alone know how to weigh properly when forming judgments about a game or a team.
The advent of the stats-oriented fan has opened many a window, but it’s still not the full picture. We really only get a glimpse of what the players and coaches and front offices concern themselves with when it’s Chipper in the booth talking about Riley’s swing.
So, without better information, I tend to think the Phillies’ overall plan yesterday was better than the Braves’ plan, and the Phillies also executed their plan more impressively than we did, particularly on the pitching side, although we didn’t pitch poorly ourselves. I don’t know that our hitting approach will be quite as poor again, or that seven Phillies pitchers will combine to make so few mistakes and keep us so off-balance over the course of another game either. But we’ll see. As we know, there’s plenty else that could go right or wrong.
Braves will win three of the next four games.
I obsess over walks and more specifically not walking. The most important pitch of the game for me is the 3-2 pitch to Olson that was a foot outside the zone. He fouled it off. Who remembers a foul ball? He would fly out on the next pitch but if he’d taken the 3-2 ball the bases would’ve been loaded with none out. Maybe Albies still GIDPs but probably not.
The other pitch I will remember as the 2-0 pitch down and in to Rosario that he popped up. Now, I don’t expect Rosario to be anything other than what he’s been all season, but that kind of AB against a rookie reliever is what makes legends out of mediocre players.
I will always believe free swinging is what made Sterling Hitchcock the NLCS MVP. This team has been patient all season but last night we chased a bit more. The Phillies also pitched almost perfectly, and they deserve a ton of credit. The Dominguez K of Acuña with 1st and 3rd was incredible. Every pitch on the black. Maybe it was luck or maybe it was clutch.
I hope we come out focused and make wheeler earn it. He will throw strikes.
That’s the difference between playoff wins and losses. The Phillies pen throws hard but they will walk a few if we allow them to. Our guys are so desperately wanting to get the big hit that we don’t even look capable of taking a walk. We basically swung at everything. Give the other team credit – they have a bunch of arms that have better stuff than our side has. We have to make them work.
I have absolute and total faith that the Braves offense will redeem itself tomorrow. If they needed any extra motivation after a couple weeks of meaningless baseball and an extra week off, they got a wakeup punch in the face. I think our bats are about to wake up.
I think our bats wake up. Lineup is way too good to go quietly into the night. Fried may certainly pitch well. I am unaffected. Braves in 5.
Braves in 5.
I have just been lurking a little this weekend. Busy and also somewhat depressed over the Braves’ part of Saturday night.
The story I am thinking about is Kyle Wright. I very well know that comparing a baseball pitcher’s shoulder to almost anybody else’s shoulder stretches things. Nonetheless, I am wondering if he had an MRI (hopefully “contrast”) in April / May. Did it show nothing? If it showed nothing and they knew based on the level of inflammation that it would be 3 to 4 months minimum to pitch again, why did they not schedule an arthroscopic exploratory?
I had pain in my right shoulder about 6 years ago. They did the “insurance shuffle.” First, therapy. After about 3 sessions, it hurt worse. Stop therapy and do an oral steroid round. Restart therapy. More pain than before, so finally got insurance to pay for an MRI. MRI shows nothing but calcified tendons (predicted by the orthopedist at first visit, but possible to lessen those through therapy.) So, orthopedist goes in to “clean up” and finds a frayed bicep tendon (on the muscle end). So, he puts 3 or 4 stitches in it. I am put on low usage for 4 weeks, then ramped back up. No problems. None of the previous pain.
So, would an arthroscopic exploratory in May have prevented Wright’s attempted comeback? And, why are they already saying “not back during 2024.” That means surgery and 10 months is not enough to get him back, UNLESS THERE IS SOMETHING VERY MAJOR and if so, HOW DID SOMEBODY NOT KNOW THAT IN APRIL / MAY?
While I have no idea about the club’s thought process behind Wright’s recovery, I kinda had the same notion: The earlier you do the surgery, the earlier you rehab & hopefully return. As for now, Wright & Soroka remain two tough-luck stories for ATL. (Maybe we bite the bullet & extend Max Fried this winter?)
And don’t you love it when your PC Dr. recommends an MRI, but insurance won’t cover it? That’s always an animated conversation.
Braves rebound today.
I feel like Soroka and Wright are two reasons why we won’t extend Fried this winter.
It’s been discussed on this thread, but there’s a distinct difference in what the Phillies bring out of their bullpen and what the Braves bring out of their’s. All the arms from the Phillies can hit 100 and that is a HUGE advantage when it comes to the playoffs that are built with off days between every game. That cannot be discounted and AA doesn’t have a single RP flamethrower on this team (at least according to today’s standards). He grabbed Pierce Johnson at the deadline and that was a good move, but there are a ton of good relievers on this team and not 1 elite reliever.
The Braves are built for longevity. The Phillies are built for bursts.
I believe in synergy and the lineup change messed up the synergy. I was going to say something before game 1 but the lineup change seemed logical at the time based upon individual histories. I just think there is more to a lineup than the individual performances. What each batter does affects the kinds of pitches the next batter gets. Obviously, if Acuna does not get on base, the whole game becomes more difficult. But I think batting Acuna and Albies 1/2 makes them both better (not to mention Olson fitting better @4). I think the Braves overthought it and Snit should go back to his instinct to maintain consistency.
Just going off memory, I feel the braves power numbers diminished after the acuña 70th steal and walk off game.
Seems like they were on pace to demolish the HR record, and then needed Ozuna to do it nearly by himself the last week just to tie it.
So between that and the weeklong layoff, I’m not feeling confident at all.
One of Acuna Jr, Olsen, Riley, Ozuna can carry this team on their own to win this game tonight.
I somehow was much more nervous before game 1.
Trea Turner misses that catch or Matt Olson gets a bigger piece of that fly ball to CF and we’re having a totally different conversation today.
Yeah, that’s what I keep coming back to. Everything went right for Philly. Shit, even the catcher interference was so incredible lucky. The bat was so close to missing his glove that people still claim that the replay doesn’t show it. Atlanta had a lot of near-misses. I think we progress to the mean (is that saying a thing?).