Chris Sale struck out nine with zero walks over 5.0 innings and the top of the lineup came through with a break through after a costly error from Mitch Haniger
The Atlanta Braves faced off against the Seattle Mariners in the final game of the three game series in which the Braves lost the first two games by a combined two runs.
After only scoring three runs in the first two games of the series combined, it is pretty obvious that the offense needed to get going if they were going to avoid their first three game skid of the year.
Emerson Hancock stood in the way of the Braves’ offense finally breaking through against the Mariners. Hancock struggles with giving up hard contact and his 17.3 percent strikeout rate is in the bottom 20.0 percent of qualified pitchers.
Things looked like they may go well for the Braves in the first inning as they were able to get two runners on when Albies and Riley had back to back walks. However, Emerson’s low strikeout rate was not the case in the first inning when he struck out Acuña, Olson, and Ozuna.
The second inning did not give much hope for the offense as Duvall struck out, followed by Harris and Arcia being retired for a three-up-three-down inning. In the third inning the Braves were able to load the bases with an Acuña, Riley single, and Olson walk. The Braves took the lead when Ozuna had an RBI via a walk which scored Acuña. This was the good news. The bad news is that Tromp and Albies had already been retired along the way via fly out and pop up respectively, and once Duvall came to the plate he hit a fly ball to Julio Rodriguez to end the inning. Obviously only scoring one run when the bases were loaded was not ideal.
Fortunately for the Braves, they were able to break it open in the fourth inning, and most of the damage was done by the top of the lineup. The top of the lineup had been struggling as of late, but today they came through. After Harris hit a groundout, Arcia was able to reach second via an error from Mitch Haniger. This error would prove to be crucial because Tromp would have potentially ended the inning with his groundout to third. The Braves were able to capitalize on this error in a major way as Acuña then scored Arcia with a single to make the game 2-0. Albies followed suit with a single putting runners on first and second. Riley then cleared the bases with a triple off of the wall that Haniger just missed to make the score 4-0. Hancock was then replaced by Trent Thorton who promptly allowed Olson to score Riley with a single of his own. The Braves ended up scoring four runs off of Hancock that were charged as unearned.
4 in the 4th!
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— Atlanta Braves (@Braves) May 1, 2024
Chris Sale was on the mound and he looked to follow up arguably his best performance of his season so far with another gem. Turns out, that was in the cards.
Sale did not give up his first base runner until Seby Zavala singled with two outs in the third. Julio Rodriguez singled following Zavala to put runners on first and second, but Sale was able to take care of business by striking out Mitch Haniger looking to end the inning. Through three innings Sale had six strikeouts and zero walks.
After Sale was able to get two outs in the fourth it looked as though he may be in a little trouble as he gave up back-to-back singles and hit Luis Urías with a pitch to load the bases, but he was able to get out of the jam unscathed when Sam Haggerty lined out to Michael Harris to end the inning.
Sale was finally tagged for a run in the fifth when Zavala doubled, moved to third on a groundout from Rodriguez, and finally scored on a bloop single from Polonco just over Olson’s head. Sale was able to get out of it with anymore damage when he struck out Cal Raleigh.
This inning ended Sale’s afternoon with a solid 5.0 innings pitched, six hits, one ER, zero walks, and nine strikeouts.
NINE Ks from Chris.#BravesCountry pic.twitter.com/7YbyZEJ0wg
— Atlanta Braves (@Braves) May 1, 2024
Dylan Lee took over and was able to get through the sixth without any damage, but then was tagged for a run with two outs in the seventh and was replaced with A.J. Minter. With a 5-2 lead Minter was shaky at first surrendering a walk to put runners on first and second, but was able to strikeout Ty France to finish up the seventh.
As what seems becoming a “per usual” scenario, Joe Jiménez came in and dominated and went three-up-three-down in the eighth, followed by Raisel Iglesias coming in to close it out. Iglesias was shaky at first giving up a walk followed by a singled, but was able to shut down the following three batters to secure the save and a 5-2 victory for the Atlanta Braves.
The Braves will have an off-day tomorrow and then travel south to face the Dodgers in a three game series.