Good Times Keep Rolling, Braves Sweep Washington
May 27-30, 2024
As expected, the Atlanta Braves took care of business at home and held off the Washington Nationals in three pretty close games. The opener of the series featured an excellent outing from Chris Sale, who held the Nationals scoreless through six innings but did give up the first career hit of super prospect Dylan Crews. The offense as a whole wasn't great, but it was great with runners in scoring position as Austin Riley produced two RBI singles with two outs and Marcell Ozuna did the same. Ozzie Albies produced a homer in the sixth inning as the Braves won 4-0.
Things didn't start out great in the second game with Charlie Morton on the mound. After a clean first inning, Morton gave up four runs in the second, the biggest being a two run double from Joey Meneses. Morton settled in and the Braves battled back, racking up 15 hits and playing just a really good game of baseball to eventually take the lead in the sixth inning on a Ronald Acuna double to score Jarred Kelenic. Raisel Iglesias and the bullpen would hold it down as the Braves eventually won the game 7-5. Orlando Arcia was the star of the game, notching four hits including two RBI and two doubles.
Game three produced the third straight good start from Bryce Elder, who only allowed an unearned run over 6.1 IP. The Braves offense kept plugging away, with the biggest swing being a homer from Matt Olson and a two RBI single from Michael Harris. With the Braves up 6-1, AJ Minter struggled and gave up a pair of runs in the ninth before Aaron Bummer got the final out in a 6-3 win.
The Braves continued the solid pitching in the last matchup with a different version of Spencer Strider, who only struck out four batters but scattered 11 baserunners while allowing two runs in 6.2 IP before the bullpen shut things down. Marcell Ozuna and Orlando Arcia knocked in five runs between two homers from them as the Braves completed the sweep with a 5-2 win.
The Braves have now won 13 of their last 14 games after losing a series at home against the Chicago Cubs, and now stand at 40-16 and are now in the double digits with 10.5 game lead over the Philadelphia Phillies in the NL East. Next up is a three-game weekend set that includes the return of Max Fried after missing a few starts. Huascar Ynoa performed admirably, but is being sent back down to AAA to make room for Fried.