Bryce Elder continued to struggle, failing to make it more than 3 innings, while the offense is in a really rough spot at the moment.
The Braves were hoping Bryce Elder could lead the way to tying the four game series and crucially eat some innings, with the Monday double-header looming.
Things did not go according to plan in the top of the first, as Bryce Elder got the first two outs without issue but then ran into serious trouble. He walked the third batter, allowed a home run, and then three consecutive singles before recording the final out of the inning, leaving the score at 3-0 Padres. He was a bit unlucky on one of the singles in particular, but when you don’t strike people out (as is Elder’s profile), you are going to live and die by the BABIP variance. The crime for Elder, as is often the case when he struggles, was issuing the walk. Importantly, Elder also needed 41 pitches to get through the one inning, the first inning of 27 (at least) over 48 hours.
The Braves’ only baserunner of the bottom of the frame came from Marcell Ozuna squeaking a ball inside the third baseline for a double. Elder got himself into trouble again in the second, walking the leadoff batter and allowing a Luis Arraez classic single. He recorded two outs and walked Cronenworth before escaping with a Machado groundout. Orlando Arcia gave the Braves another baserunner with a leadoff single that was just snagged by Machado, saving the double and setting up the subsequent double-play from Harris started by Machado, ending the only Atlanta threat of the inning.
Elder managed a clean top of the third, and a Ronald Acuna walk with two outs was the only baserunner for Atlanta in the home frame. Elder found himself on the wrong side of the BABIP gods again in the top fourth. Two leadoff singles were followed by a Tatis double off the right field wall that took a funky bounce, allowing two runners to score, albeit on a tight play at the plate on the relay from Olson that was initially called an out but was overturned on replay. Another double from Profar brought home Tatis, scoring the sixth run for the Padres and ending Elder’s night with 3.0 innings pitched with 7 earned runs, 3 walks, and 2 strikeouts. Ray Kerr took over and struck out Cronenworth, saw a sinking fly ball bounce off Acuna’s glove for an error, got a great running play on a fly ball by Kelenic for the second out, and struck out Merrill to end the inning.
After a quiet inning from the Braves’ offense, Kerr allowed a leadoff homer to Luis Campusano, but sat down the top of the Padres order after that on two strikeouts and a weak grounder. Nothing notable happened through the end of the sixth, but Ray Kerr did allow another solo homer with one out in the seventh, ending his evening with a respectable 3.1 innings of 2 run ball with four strikeouts and no walks, as Jesse Chavez entered the game. Jesse handled the rest of the seventh and after more nothing from the Braves’ offense, Dylan Lee took care of the eighth in 1-2-3 fashion. Luke Williams got to pitch the top of the ninth for Atlanta, putting the Padres down in a 1-2-3 frame. The offense did at least score in the ninth, with a Chadwick Tromp leadoff double and an Ozzie Albies RBI single, but that ended the scoring for the night, as a double play ended the game. This was a continuation of a brutal stretch of offense from Atlanta, which has featured bad luck and injuries, but horrendous production.
Join us tomorrow in a double-header, where I really hope the offense can put something together more enjoyable than this game tonight.