The Atlanta Braves battled the New York Mets in a tight game which resulted in a narrow defeat.
Tonight’s game was not the most enjoyable watch for me… and maybe for you too. The biggest bright spot for the Atlanta Braves tonight was a young man named Max Fried!
Fried pitched 6 innings, giving up 5 hits, 1 ER, 2 BB, with 8 SO. His one earned run scored after he exited the game due to cramping in his left hand. It was stated that this was just a precaution as the Braves did not want to take a chance, now that it was announced that Ynoa will be out for a couple of months.
Bottom line is, Fried was pretty good tonight. He reminded me of the 2020 Fried that was leading the broken down Braves pitching staff as its ace.
But just as the Mets offense does when Jacob deGrom is on the hill… The Braves offense did not show up and back a strong performance by Fried.
Up until the 8th, the only hit by the Braves came from Fried himself, which was a single in the bottom of the 3rd. That’s pretty pathetic.
The good news though is that Austin Riley is continuing to somewhat trend upward after knocking out a solo homerun in the 8th (his 4th of the year).
And you can say that it was to be expected that the offense could be lackluster after the offensive performances this past weekend in Milwaukee, but this offense is just way too inconsistent. Especially when the offense was the strongest part of the team the past two seasons.
A lot of the players are struggling and it’s pretty worrisome.
For me, I am just a little worried that Freddie Freeman and Marcell Ozuna are hitting .218 and .211 respectively in the 2 and 3 spot in the lineup, but I expect them to turn things around. Hopefully that’s sooner rather than later.
One player I don’t see turning it around as easily is Dansby Swanson.
He struck out yet again tonight, making it 51 SO on the season… That’s not good. He’s had 150 plate appearances this year and 51 of them resulted in strikeouts. That’s a 34% SO rate… yikes. I’m obviously rooting for the guy, but he could definitely use a few days off to reboot or something.
And, maybe get him out of the 5 spot in the lineup, Snit? Just maybe? What do I know?
Speaking of struggling, the Braves bullpen was at it again tonight! Now, of course, Jacob Webb had to enter in a pretty tough spot, but his performance (like a lot of his performances this season) was really just not good at all.
Unfortunately, Webb was a little too wild tonight, resulting in Kevin Pillar getting hit in the face in a disturbing moment. This came with the bases loaded. Thoughts are with Pillar because that was very scary.
Sean Newcomb, who would enter after Webb, would end up giving up a run in the 8th on a soft contact bloop into right.
At the end of the day, it was a tight game until it wasn’t and unfortunately, the Braves couldn’t pull it off. The biggest thing hurting the Braves right now is consistency. When one part of the team succeeds, it usually results in another part struggling. A real seesaw effect for the Braves right now.
Tomorrow is another day and we’ll see what the kid, Tucker Davidson, has in store in his first start of 2021!