Philadephia rallied against Aaron Bummer in a game that was a…disappointment. The Braves gave up a 3-2 lead and suffered their first loss of 2024, 5-4, Sunday afternoon.
I resisted the urge to call it a bummer. You’re welcome!
The Phlies rallied from a run down in the bottom of the seventh, spoiling a solid debut by Chris Sale. Sale struck out seven in 5.1 innings of work. He allowed two runs, two walks, and five hits in his first start of the season. The lanky lefty exited in the bottom of the sixth with a lead. Sale was brought in to solidify the rotation, and this outing was a good start!
Phillies rally
Bryson Stott drew a lead-off walk from Joe Jimenez to open the seventh inning. Bummer was brought on to face pinch-hitter, Brandon Marsh, and he struck out Marsh for out number one. With one down, Johan Rojas grounded into what appeared to be an inning-ending double-play. After extensive looks at the replay, NY got it right, and the call was unfortunately overturned. Kyle Schwarber then followed with a rare single and Trea Turner shot one thru the right side to plate Rojas. With the game tied 3-3, Alec Bohm still hasn’t touched home plate, but did manage to fist one into left-field, just out of Adam Duvall‘s reach. The Bohm bloop scored both Schwarber and Turner to give the Phlies a 5-3 lead.
Things looked good early for the Braves. Ronald Acuña Jr. led off the game with a walk and Ozzie Albies homered for the second day in a row. Albies took Ranger Suarez deep and has now homered from each side of the plate in the season’s first three games. Duvall added an RBI when he plated Austin Riley in the top of the fourth inning.
Atlanta looked to be in good shape for the sweep when Bummer retired Marsh and induced the Rojas ground ball. Raisel Iglesias was the lone remaining right-hander in the bullpen, however, so Snitker stayed with Bummer. The Braves were never going to finish 162-0, but that was a…disappointment.
Always fighting
The Braves didn’t go down without a fight. With one out in the top of the eighth, Jarred Kelenic doubled off the left-centerfield wall. Kelenic is hitting a cool .714 early in the season. He scored shortly thereafter on a single by Albies. The inning ended when Matt Olson flew out to right. That was a…disappointment, too!
Taking two of three from the Phlies to start the year is a successful series. The Braves head to Chicago to take on the south-siders in a three-game series that looks to be tenuous, at best, weather-wise. You gotta love early season games scheduled in the north. Temps look to be in the upper 30s and low 40s with precipitation forecast all three days. Uncle Charlie Morton is set to make his 2024 debut Monday afternoon.
Cold weather games seem to be the ultimate performance neutralizer. I hope that Braves at neutral can beat the White Sox at neutral.
Soroka pitched for the White Sox yesterday and it didn’t go well: 5 IP, 7 H, 4R, 3BB, 0 Ks. I want to see him work it out, but maybe AA was right in letting him walk.
Gwinnett Update: Bryce Elder threw 6.1 IP of 2H, 7K shutout baseball and Stripers won 10-0. J.P Martinez continues to show that he needs to be in the bigs.
To answer yesterday’s question, yes, I think Bummer suffered some BABIP issues. He was very close to getting out of it twice – once with a just missed DP and second with a bloop that Duvall almost caught. Either of those would have stymied the rally and allowed the Braves to win.
I think Minter went through some of that same luck with BABIP early last year. And Fried suffered bad umpiring the prior day. I think Bummer will be solid as the season goes along. Again, I am most concerned about him and Matzek at this point. Of all the teams in the league, we might match up worst against the Phils and yet we won 2/3 and only lost the one by a single run. I can live with 161-1 🙂
If this is what bad luck looks like for the Braves, this season will go very well (i.e. the Braves can only be beaten by bad luck and bad calls).
Pros:
– Sale looked pretty good; his slider was pretty nasty, and it’s good to see he can still hit 97-98 mph with his fastball when he needs to
– Ozzie continues his hot start to the season with another HR
– Kelenic’s AB was impressive; fouling off a few pitches and then driving a low-and-away sinker to the opposite field isn’t easy to do
– Duvall’s outfield assist was great
Cons:
– Bummer didn’t look great and left too many pitches in the middle of the zone, though he did get BABIP’ed a bit
– A stronger throw from Ozzie might have resulted in a DP; hoping his 3rd percentile arm strength doesn’t become a liability
I don’t know if I mentioned it before, but I really can’t stand that Alec Bohm