The Atlanta Braves allowed the Diamondbacks to score ten consecutive runs in Arizona’s 10-3 win at Truist Park on Saturday night.
Here is Today’s Three Things from the contest.
The Turning Point
The second inning, believe it or not.
Atlanta jumped out to an early 2-0 lead in this one thanks to a Ronald Acuña Jr. leadoff home run and multiple other hits, but Arizona came roaring back in the top of the 2nd.
Ever dangerous cleanup hitter Gabriel Moreno led off the inning with a five-pitch walk, being moved to third on a Max Kepler double in the gap. Arizona then began bringing those runners in, scoring one on a Nolan Arenado grounder and a second on a Tim Tawa single to left. After a groundout pushed Tawa to 2nd, rookie (and #9 hitter) Ryan Waldschmidt drove Tawa in from second, with Tawa sliding in just ahead of a 94 mph throw home from Ronald Acuña Jr.to give Arizona a 3-2 lead.
The Braves looked to try and battle back in the bottom half of the inning, with Lane Thomas battling through a seven-pitch at-bat for a leadoff double, but Atlanta went strikeout, fly out, and pop out to end the inning and the threat.
Arizona added three more in the third inning to take a 6-2 lead, while the Braves didn’t record another hit until there were two outs in the fifth inning (and even that was a bit iffy, as the batted ball was only 74.9 mph and shortstop Geraldo Perdomo just…missed it, with the slow roller bouncing off his glove and into shallow left field.
Their next hit came in the ninth inning, after the deficit had ballooned to eight runs.
Today’s Player of the Game
Hard to pick someone, but we’ll give it to Ronald Acuña Jr. He led off the bottom of the first with a home run, as well as picked up the “single” later, but it’s really because of his defense.
Jake talked on yesterday’s postcast about how Ronald offensively doesn’t feel like the same guy when he’s the designated hitter. But when he’s both the right fielder and leadoff man, there are some times where he just locks in and finds multiple ways to impact the game.
The offensive potential is obvious, but he had three different defensive plays that showed why the best configuration of the team is with his arm in right field, even if his range and defensive jumps aren’t what they used to be.
The first was on a single to left. With a speedy outfielder running from second on contact, Ronald barehanded a grounder and fired home at 96.4 mph, just barely missing the runner.
The next inning, he did it two more times, first chasing down a Corbin Carroll line drive in the corner and almost beating the runner to the bag with an 89 mph throw…
And then perfectly playing a carom off the wall and almost getting the runner at second thanks to a 94.3 mph throw.
I’ve watched enough baseball where there are few things that’ll make me sit up in my chair quite like Ronald Acuña. Jr. having a chance to throw out a runner with that howitzer for a right arm he carries.
What You’ll Be Talking About
What to do with Grant Holmes.
He was charged with six runs on six hits in his 3.2 innings, walking three and striking out three. We knew it was a tough matchup going in, but I didn’t expect it to unfold quite the way it did: Holmes getting absolutely shelled.
The Diamondbacks put 14 balls in play off of Holmes, with nine of those being hard-hit and the average exit velocity allowed an absurd 96.2 mph. Most of his batted balls allowed were in the air, as well, with only five of the 14 having a launch angle below 15°. He did manage to find 8 whiffs in there, but it took 27 swings to get them.
That being said, multiple members of the Braves beat at the ballpark reported that Walt Weiss, in postgame, said that Holmes will be making his next start as planned and that AJ Smith-Shawver, who was eligible to return to the majors as of Friday, is a candidate to come up and help out of the bullpen.
I’m sorry, but if this isn’t just Walt Weiss protecting his guy, I think that’s a mistake.
Holmes has shown concerning peripherals and enough instability when he gets to the second turn through the order that it feels pretty tense when he pitches.
For the record, he’s only allowed more than three runs in two starts this year, although some of that’s due to being pulled early - he has nine starts where he hasn’t finished five innings.
Similar to how the likely playoff lineup for the club includes Acuña in RF, Mauricio Dubón at short, and Sean Murphy behind the plate while Drake Baldwin DHs, the likely playoff rotation doesn’t include Holmes; instead, AJ Smith-Shawver would work behind Chris Sale and Tyler Mahle.
And it’s not like the tradeoff of carrying Holmes in the rotation is the length, because he’s not giving you that, either. At a certain point, Smith-Shawver needs more than the “27th man for a DH” start that he’s gotten so far since returning from the IL.
Looking for more discussion about this game?
Here’s tonight’s Postcast where I went live to break down the contest.
What’s Next for the Braves?
Atlanta’s looking to avert a sweep tomorrow afternoon at 1:35, with Bryce Elder (8-7, 4.03) taking on old friend Michael Soroka (8-3, 2.92) on BravesVision.
After Holmes' last start (a good one) he said that after throwing a bull pen with Joey Bart, Bart told him, "When you throw in the pen, you have the best stuff in MLB". Hard to imagine, but Holmes said it was eye opening and that he was taking a new and improved plan to the mound. Once again tonight we were treated to lead off walks and multiple hanging breaking balls that became rockets. Looked like the regular Holmes to me. The Braves might limp to a division title but I'm not sure, especially after wasting another great start by Sale last night. The thought of Holmes or Elder starting a playoff game is actually frightening.
I believe that Atlanta’s problem is that their hitters are too passive. They don’t appear to have any Doberman’s in their lineup. They should be the ones with 7-10 runs each night and wanting to beat the opponent into submission. You can overcome bad pitching if your scoring runs at that rate. Weiss also has to become more aggressive at taking pitcher’s like Holmes out much sooner.