Zach Wheeler faced off against Chris Sale, so, naturally, it was a slugfest.

I hate facing Wheeler; he normally just kills us. Coming into tonight, he had a 2.95 ERA in 189 innings against the Braves.

But tonight, he hit the showers with an ugly line of five earned on eight hits in just 5 1/3, his worst performance against us since September 12, 2023, when he yielded six runs in five innings. Those are the only two times he’s given up that many to us since signing with the Phillies in the 2019-2020 offseason, and brother, I’ll take it.

But what Wheeler was pleased to yield, Chris Sale just as quickly coughed up, getting knocked out in the fifth inning after giving up five runs of his own. Pretty much all the damage was done by Kyle Schwarber and Nick Castellanos; the former had a triple and a homer and the latter had two doubles, accounting for six of the team’s nine hits and all five of their RBI.

Sale’s got a 6.75 ERA in three starts; he hasn’t recorded more than 15 outs or given up fewer than three runs in any of them. Tonight, he was sitting at 91-93 with his fastball. Also, interestingly, Mike Petriello notices his arm angle is much lower than usual. We’ll see whether Bravda makes any excuses for him. Any silence would be deafening.

But that’s the negatives. There were a lot of positives to the game! All of the starters hit safely, and Riley and Murphy had two hits apiece; Riley had two doubles and one RBI and Murphy had a homer and 4 RBI of his own.

Jarred Kelenic, astonishingly, was 1-1 with three walks, two runs, and a really nice diving catch in right. Even Orlando Arcia was 1-3 with a walk!

And the bullpen was pretty impressive. Enyel de los Santos came on the fifth to bail out Sale, and he did a serviceable job in the Anthony Varvaro role. Dylan Lee and Daysbel Hernandez then looked pretty impressive, Lee touching 97 with his fastball and Hernandez sitting at 98 with some nasty high cheese. Finally, Raisel Iglesias came in and shut the door.

In general, it was the kind of game that felt like this lineup doing what it’s capable of. The team certainly looked more relaxed at home than they did on the West Coast. Two more here in Atlanta, then down to the Florida coast to play the Rays in their temporary spring training digs. Get ready for some wild weather.

One final note: during the game, the Braves picked up Rafael Montero from the Astros in what seems to have mostly been a salary dump; The Braves will send a PTBNL over, and the Astros are giving us cash “to cover the majority” of his salary. According to Savant, he’s still getting whiffs, so, for a minor deal, this seems like a net positive. (Update: per the AP (with h/t to MLBTR) the Braves are still on the hook for $3 million. So, it’s not complete chump change.)

A comeback win! How ’bout that!