Today's Three Things: Grant Holmes's Quality Start Propels Braves to Win vs Miami

Grant Holmes made it into the seventh inning for the first time since April.

The Atlanta Braves defeated the Miami Marlins 4-2 in Truist Park on Tuesday night, taking an early 1-0 lead in the midweek series.

Here is Today’s Three Things from the contest.

The Turning Point

The bottom of the 7th.

Grant Holmes was lifted after a leadoff single to open the top half of the inning because the Braves were nursing just a one-run lead. (More on Holmes in a minute). Austin Riley apparently felt bad that Holmes couldn’t go longer.

After Lane Thomas made his Braves debut as a pinch-hitter (against a lefty, naturally), using his speed to get on base with one out thanks to a defensive error from Otto Lopez, Riley had his chance to pick up Holmes.

Lefty John King did his part, leaving a 1-1 curveball out over the plate, and Riley demolished it - 106.7 mph off the bat and 433 feet to left-center field, pushing Atlanta’s lead to 3-0.

I don’t want to say it, but I’m going to say it - is Austin Riley finally starting to come out of his funk? Since the All-Star Break, he’s hitting .290/.343/.532 with four homers and 12 RBI in 17 games. If it really is the start of a return to form, even the 2024-2025 form, this is (Chip Caray voice) “like making a trade without making a trade.”

Today’s Player of the Game

With 73% of the vote, it’s Grant Holmes.

Grant facing one batter in the seventh meant that not only did he finish six innings for the first time in over a month (June 3rd), but pitched into the seventh for the first time since April 8th.

And the way Holmes did it was great: embracing Jeremy Hefner’s multi-fastball philosophy. I wrote back in February about how Grant Holmes, somehow, had one of the worst four-seam fastballs in the league despite throwing it only about 30% of the time. Grant finally adjusted tonight, cutting its usage to just 11% in favor of 25% sinkers and 13% cutters. While he got only one whiff on the sinker on six swings, he still got a 32% whiff rate and 29% CSW overall and was efficient, sitting at just 72 pitches when lifted in the seventh.

While everything wasn’t perfect for Holmes -averaging 92.1 mph on his batted ball events despite only six of the 17 being hard-hit - he got more groundouts (six) than flyouts (five), walked only one, and didn’t allow an earned run.

And what folks don’t always realize is that while Grant hasn’t always given length, he’s been good at not getting blown up. Per Braves Today contributor Taylor, Grant’s allowed fewer than four runs in his last 14 outings and in 20 of his 21 appearances this season. His ERA, which is now 3.67, has him in the Top 50 in MLB, beating such notable names as Sandy Alcantara, Logan Webb, George Kirby, Paul Skenes, and Jacob DeGrom.

Every time it appears that Holmes is on the verge of getting bumped back out of the rotation for the bullpen, he reaches into his bag and has a start like this, one that reminds us why Alex Anthopoulos wanted to put him in the rotation to start the season.

What You’ll Be Talking About

Taking some creative liberties here, but…the public sentiment versus the actual on-field performance.

Tonight was Atlanta’s sixth straight win, with the team being just half a game behind the Los Angeles Dodgers for the second seed in the National League (and having taken a series from both LA and the Brewers). They’re currently 68-45, and even if they played just under .500 the rest of the way, they’d finish with 92 wins.

Atlanta’s the only team in baseball to have four players with 19 or more home runs, after Ozzie’s solo shot tonight gave him exactly 19 on the year. He joins Michael Harris II and Drake Baldwin (20) and Matt Olson (31) at the top of the team’s leaderboards.

And yet, the public morale has seemingly never been lower.

The lack of an impact starter at the deadline has a lot of fans resigned to being non-competitive when October gets here, and there’s not a lot of faith that the team can map out their 27 outs successfully against some of the best teams in the league. (More on that later this week.)

Some fans have decided to just stop watching altogether or are even rooting for the team to lose, so that the organization might consider moving on from the general manager.

Let me be clear: I’m not here to tell anyone how to be a fan…but that being said, the idea of rooting against your team, one that’s been among the league’s top teams so far this year, blows my mind.

Listen, I get it. I’m also frustrated. I wish the Braves had added pitching at the deadline, and disagree with Alex Anthopoulos that there wasn’t anyone below the level of Tarik Skubal/Jacob DeGrom/Logan Webb worth adding.

But at the same time, the deadline was yesterday. It’s done, and there’s nothing we can do about it. The Japanese have a word for this, called “shoganai”, which essentially represents a mindset of acknowledging some events are outside of your control and consequently letting go of your frustration.

To channel Bill Belichick, “We’re on to Miami.”

Looking for more discussion about this game?

Here’s tonight’s Postcast, with me and Locked On Braves host Jake Mastroianni, as we went live to break down the contest.

What’s Next for the Braves?

Atlanta’s going for the early series in game two, with Bryce Elder (7-6, 3.84) taking on Eury Perez (5-8, 3.44) at 7:15 PM ET.