The Atlanta Braves defeat the Phillies with a strong offensive showing

The Atlanta Braves got the Friday night fireworks started a little early tonight, as they defeat the Philadelphia Phillies 8-1.

Well, that was fun to watch as a Braves fan.

Before we dive into the game, let us take a moment and appreciate the cleanest jerseys in all of baseball.

Those throwback jerseys are beautiful. Hopefully, we see them a lot this year.

Now that I have gotten that out of my system, we can talk baseball.

The offense finally shows up

Outside of Ronald Acuña Jr., the Braves offense had been pretty bad to start 2021.

Acuña looked great again tonight. After a 4-4 night, he moved his wRC+ to 245 and OPS to 1.290 on the year. That is a phenomenal start to the season.

He also did this tonight.

This should also be a reminder that people really wanted Fernando Tatis Jr. or Juan Soto over Ronald Acuña Jr. I will happily take Acuña.

Through the first week of the season, the Braves offense struggled overall. The Braves had a 51 wRC+ (100 wRC+ is average) as a team through the first six games.

The offense has looked sluggish early on in 2021.

Thankfully, that changed on Friday night as the entire Braves offense broke out in a big way. After Acuña’s two-run bomb in the 5th inning, Travis d’Arnaud would bring Ozzie Albies around to score to make the score 3-1.

In the 6th inning, new United States citizen, Ehire Adrianza, blasted a three-run home run to bring the score to 6-1. Adrianza showing that Pablo Sandoval is not the only valuable bat off the Braves bench.

Then in the 8th inning, with the game already in hand, Freddie Freeman showed off some of that “dad strength”, hitting a two-run home run to give the Braves a commanding 8-1 lead that would prove to be the final score.

After several weeks of not being able to see his family, it looks like they were able to give him a little extra jolt for tonight’s game. Maybe this is the start of a hot stretch for MVFree.

Charlie Morton and the pitching deserve some love too.

Charlie Morton– 6IP, 4 H, 1 ER, 1 BB, 7 Ks.

That will play.  Add in twelve swings and misses and Morton had himself a dominating night, outpitching Zack Wheeler to earn the win.

The only blemish on Morton’s night came off the bat of Andrew McCutchen, who hit a 66 MPH looper in the 3rd inning to bring the Phillies their only run of the evening.

It would prove not to matter, as Charlie would get his first win in a Braves uniform since August 28th, 2008.

Tyler Matzek, Nate Jones, and Luke Jackson would all throw scoreless innings to keep the Phillies from catching the Braves. The Braves pitching staff now sits at a 3.02 ERA early in the season.

Braves win! On to tomorrow!

The Atlanta Braves remain undefeated in season home openers.  It was a fun night and gives us Braves fans a lot to be excited about moving forward even though the team currently sits at 3-4.

With how much the offense has struggled (outside of Acuña) early in the season, the record could easily be worse. The offense showed signs of life tonight, so hopefully things are turning it around!

The pitching staff continues to impress as a unit. Charlie Morton looks like he could potentially end up being one of the better offseason acquisitions.

One final thing before we go, shout out to the young Phillies fan who gave the Freddie Freeman home run ball to a young Braves fan in a Freeman jersey. Classy move.

That is what it’s really all about. Forget the rivalry and enjoy the game together. Shoutout to the dad for raising his kid to be a good person.

Now, it is time to get ready for Saturday night’s contest when the Braves take on the Phillies again at 7:20 EDT. Currently, Zach Eflin is scheduled to take on Ian Anderson: For the A!