The team with a 12/4 K/BB ratio pitching-wise lost to the team with the 7/5 K/BB ratio by six runs because the Giants hit three homers
The Braves lost big again on Wednesday afternoon, dropping a series where the winning team scored nine runs in each game to the San Francisco Giants. The big blows in this one were three homers, two hit by Rafael Devers; the Braves hit zero homers and, predictably, lost big. There are a lot of stories you could tell about this season, but probably the most pervasive one is that, at a very basic level, the Braves are simply not hitting enough homers to carry the weight of everything else they’re dealing with, including giving up a bunch of homers. So it goes.
The pitching matchup in this one was theoretically of interest, with Spencer Strider (really good since his five-start tune-up in his return from injury) facing off against Justin Verlander (really not good lately, or on the season). In the end, Strider ended up allowing two homers while the Braves just got a bunch of walks off Verlander, and that was pretty much that.
The first inning of the game was bizarre, with both hurlers throwing a ton of pitches and clogging the bases, but ultimately no runs crossed the plate. Strider had two walks and escaped a bases-loaded, two-out jam when Casey Schmitt flew out weakly to left in a 2-0 count on a crushable fastball. Verlander issued three walks but saw the frame end as Michael Harris II hit a ball hard but at a high enough angle that it ended up being catchable by the right fielder in front of the wall.
Things were far more orderly after that, as Strider got into a bit of a groove, throwing a quick second and then striking out two each in the third and fourth. He even stranded a just-fair leadoff double in the third in the process. Meanwhile, the Braves were desperately trying to punish a not-sharp Verlander, but just couldn’t do it. Nacho Alvarez Jr. crushed an elevated fastball for a barreled out to dead center, and in his next PA, hit what should’ve been a near-ideal donut hole bloop (99 percent hit probability), only for it to get robbed on a diving catch.
The fifth marked the third time through for Strider, and, well, it didn’t go well this time, either. After a strikeout, Strider faced off against Rafael Devers, and threw him a 3-2 slider that ended up at about the height of his shoetops. Devers went down to get it, and with basically a one-handed swing, yanked the ball at just 93 mph over the fence in right for a solo homer. After a hit-by-pitch, Strider then yielded a much more traditional 103 mph homer to Matt Chapman, and the Braves were basically toast then and there, as there was no way they were going to be able to hit multiple homers in this game given a Ronald Acuña Jr.-less lineup and, well, the rest of the 2025 season that we’ve witnessed to date.
Strider’s day ended with a 7/3 K/BB ratio and an xFIP below 4.00, but he too now has a HR/FB approaching 15 percent. Brilliant. After a six-start stretch where he avoided homers altogether, he’s now given up five in his last four outings. Verlander pitched horribly, with a 3/5 K/BB ratio, but the Braves couldn’t actually do anything to make that matter in the runs tally department — their only hit off of him was a bloop down the foul line. Verlander struck out Drake Baldwin for his final out of the game — with Baldwin representing the tying run at the time and going down on a 2-2 curveball that really should’ve been a 3-1 curveball after a terrible strike call earlier in the sequence.
With the starters gone, things didn’t get any better for the Braves. Dylan Dodd gave up a much more “traditional” homer to Devers in the sixth, this time of the three-run variety. That homer came on a not-low-or-in-enough cutter a pitch after Dodd almost brained Devers with a fastball. A combination of Dane Dunning (horrible) and Aaron Bummer (pitching in a blowout again for some reason, say the line, Bart) bled some more tack-on runs.
The Braves finally strung together some offense against Sean Hjelle in the seventh, with a few seeing-eye singles, a line-drive single, and then a bloop ground-rule double by Baldwin. A groundout capped the scoring at 9-3. After this, Dylan Lee and Raisel Iglesias came on and absolutely eviscerated the Giants for the final six outs (five dominant strikeouts and a pop-out), but that was really just wrapping up the string at that point. Pinch-hitter Marcell Ozuna was rung up for the first out of the bottom of the final frame on a clear non-strike (stop trying to walk argghghghghghghghghg) and that was pretty much that.
The Braves will now spare you having to watch their cursed season for a day before they head out on a long road trip, where they’ll make their first two stops in two other parks hosting fairly disappointing (but not as disastrous as the Braves) teams in the Rangers and Royals.