Today's Three Things: Martín Pérez Outduels Nolan McLean to Even Series
The Atlanta Braves got six scoreless from the veteran Pérez and two key home runs in a quiet night from the offense.
The Atlanta Braves shut out the New York Mets, winning 4-09 in Truist Park on Tuesday night
Here is Today’s Three Things from the contest.
The Turning Point
The bottom of the fifth and top of the sixth.
Ozzie Albies opened the bottom of the fifth on a home run, breaking Nolan McLean’s no-hitter and staking Atlanta to a 1-0 lead. It was some poor pitch selection and locations by McLean; up 0-2 and having gotten Ozzie to chase a curveball inside that was barely fouled off, McLean threw a waist-high fastball on the outer third and Ozzie not only got to it, he pulled it into The Chop House.
It is Ozzie’s 20th homer of the season, the fifth time Albies has reached that mark in his career. He’s now tied with Chase Utley and Ian Kinsler for the 11th-most seasons with 20+ home runs for a second baseman, which isn’t bad for a guy that’s only 5-7.
But the Mets immediately tried to get that run back. Bo Bichette drew a one-out walk in a relatively uncompetitive five-pitch at-bat, and Luis Robert Jr. immediately singled him over to third.
But despite the game-tying run being on third, neither Pérez nor manager Walt Weiss blinked. In a left-on-left matchup against Carson Benge, Pérez used some cutters to set up several changeups on both sides of the plate until he got an inning-ending double play.
Today’s Player of the Game
With a whopping 86% of the vote, Pérez won his seventh POTG award, tying him for fourth place with Michael Harris II.
Pérez didn’t have inputs that matched the production, somehow converting only seven whiffs (all on the changeup), an average exit velocity of 92.2 mph, and eight hard-hit balls into six scoreless innings with just four hits and three walks to two strikeouts.
But even though he wasn’t ‘taking the sting out of the swing’, as it were, Pérez was mitigating the damage. Of the seven batted balls with exit velocity of 100 mph or higher, all of them were on the ground save for one pop-up. Several of these had decently high expected batting averages, indicating that Atlanta’s infield defense put in the work behind Pérez, but it was enough to keep the Mets off the board for yet another quality start.
Pérez now has a 1.08 ERA across his last five outings and an 18-inning scoreless streak, the third-longest active streak in MLB. While the highest and best use for Pérez in the postseason is probably out of the bullpen, working as the lefty groundball specialist that both Aaron Bummer and Danny Young were supposed to be, he might end up starting at this rate. It’s hard to argue that off all of Atlanta’s back-end starters, that he’s the one to try and go through the order once before a high-octane bullpen arm comes in.
What You’ll Be Talking About
The offense in this one, for both better and worse.
The Braves finished with just three hits tonight: Ozzie’s homer, an eighth-inning single from Michael Harris, and an absolute MOONSHOT of a home run from Matt Olson into The Chop House.
I normally share the home broadcast calls in the recaps, but this Mets booth’s reaction to Olson’s homer was too good to not share.
That simultaneous “ohhhhh” by the entire Mets booth was just… chef’s kiss
This homer was Olson’s 35th of the season, tying him with some of the game’s best power hitters (Yordan Alvarez, Kyle Schwarber, Junior Caminero) for the league lead.
Also in the better column for Atlanta’s offense today: six walks to only four strikeouts.
But in the worse column is the fact that Atlanta had just three hits and outside of the home runs, have struggled to score in the last week. Atlanta has just 17 runs across the last 46 innings, with one of those coming via ‘Manfred Man’ in extras. It’s understandable to be held down by a rotation like the Yankees’, sporting Max Fried, Gerrit Cole, and Cam Schlittler, but to have just twelve hits in two games versus the Mets?
It’s possible I’m overthinking this, but for all the online discourse around the rotation and its postseason configuration, the offense is likely holding Atlanta’s October fate and it’s hard to feel like they’ve passed the test in the last week.
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 looking to win the series tomorrow night at 7:15, with Tyler Mahle (3-9, 4.83) making his second start for the Braves opposite Mets lefty Zac Thornton (3-2, 2.52).