Bats break out, but Braves still lose amid Sale struggles, 11-9 (2024)

There was a point in this game where, trailing 11-9 in the eighth, the Braves hit three straight barrels. Guess how many runs they scored in that half-inning. Well, chances are, you know already: zero. To be clear, the sequence below led to zero runs:

That’s how it went for Atlanta on Saturday afternoon, as they dropped their first June game to fall to 32-24 on the season.

This game had a lot of twists and turns, but fundamentally, it hinged on a few things: Chris Sale struggling, barreled outs, and some questionable bullpen management (that maybe didn’t really matter in the end, given the first two).

Let’s start with Sale. The veteran lefty dominated in May, getting charged with two runs in five starts, and throwing up a 45/2 K/BB ratio. He started June, and things went south almost immediately. He was charged with two runs (the same as happened in May) before the first inning ended, as Daz Cameron took a slider over the plate and smashed it for a two-run double after a couple of hits. One of those hits was the result of a sliding stop by Orlando Arcia and a bounced throw that Matt Olson couldn’t scoop, and it was the first of a number of defensive issues in this game.

The Braves actually got those two runs back, on a two-run homer by Marcell Ozuna against Aaron Brooks. The homer itself was kind of funny: Brooks got ahead 0-1 with a get-me-over slider, and tried to throw the next one outside, but hung it. It was maybe the most obviously set-up thing to homer on in this game. Anyway, that feels like days ago at this point.

Sale went back to work, and things got so much worse. He was greeted by Zack Gelof doubling on a ball that bounced off Adam Duvall’s glove in right field. Up next was a single by Aledmys Diaz that was knocked down by the wind, such that left fielder Jarred Kelenic, expecting it to float to him, couldn’t snag it as he was drifting over. A weak single through the infield made it 3-2, and two batters later, Miguel Andujar lined a homer to left-center. It quickly became a 6-2 rout(ish), off the guy vying to be MLB’s best(ish) pitcher with another good start.

Sale ended up pitching four innings, allowing a two-run homer to Brent Rooker in the fourth. He finished with a 4/1 K/BB ratio and the two homers allowed in those four frames; it was his first multi-homer game of the year after allowing just four total in his ten starts so far. I’m probably not going to watch any postgame media about this game (I never do), but I do wonder how hard Sale is going to take this, given that the bats broke out and he fell apart when they did.

The Braves, though, to their credit, didn’t let this game actually become a rout. In the second, Adam Duvall hit the first of what would be a cadre of disappointments on the afternoon, a .900 xBA flyout. Michael Harris II doubled to start the bottom of the third, and eventually came around to score on an Ozuna groundout. In the fifth, they battled all the way back and even took the lead. Arcia started with a one-out single hit so hard it smashed off Gelof at second, and another Harris double put two in scoring position. Austin Riley followed with a grounder that was thrown away by Abraham Toro at third, scoring both runners. An Ozuna single and cheapo, wind-aided Olson homer tied the game. Olson’s homer was pretty funny, too, in that he got the low-and-inside breaking pitch from reliever T.J. MacFarland that he likes to sit on, didn’t really get all of it, but was rewarded anyway. (Oakland starter, journeyman Aaron Brooks, was legitimately awful with a 1/1 K/BB ratio in 4 ¹⁄₃ innings, getting lifted right before Olson’s homer.)

Even after tying the game, they weren’t done. Travis d’Arnaud worked a walk, moved to second on a ball that got by catcher Shea Langeliers, and scored on Adam Duvall’s roller single, though Duvall was thrown out trying to take second to end the inning. But, the Braves couldn’t hold this lead, at all.

Jimmy Herget, who pitched a scoreless fifth after Sale departed, was asked to throw another frame. An infield single and then a one-out ball that hit off Herget and also went for a single prompted the Braves to remove Herget for Pierce Johnson to face Rooker. Johnson got ahead of Rooker, 1-2, and then threw another curveball that wasn’t quite as low as the ones he had gotten whiffs on. Rooker didn’t hit it particularly well, but with the wind blowing out to right, it carried and hit high off the wall and then off Duvall’s leg. It ended up being a de facto triple that gave Oakland a 10-9 lead; Johnson stranded Rooker at third, but the damage was done.

The Braves put together two singles off Jack O’Loughlin, who started the bottom of the sixth, but both Riley and Ozuna flew out, the latter off new reliever Michael Kelly, to keep it a 10-9 game. Riley’s ball was hit 96.7 mph to right and landed harmlessly in a glove for an out, while Rooker’s go-ahead hit the prior inning was hit 96 mph to right and hit high off the wall. Ozuna’s out was a barrel that didn’t even make it to the warning track.

The Braves almost scored against Kelly in the seventh, too, with a couple of walks, but Jarred Kelenic’s liner to left was hit at a fielder, instead of not at a fielder. In the eighth, Dylan Lee was asked to face a bunch of righties and gave up a run in the process. That made the comeback less likely, but in the end, it kind of didn’t matter, because the bottom of the eighth consisted of that snip from above. The Braves had three consecutive barrels off Scott Alexander, and got two outs and a double from it. Austin Adams relieved Alexander and struck out Ozuna. I don’t know if there’s even been a three-barrel, no-run inning before, but I’d be surprised if there was. Maybe in 2022.

The Braves caught a gigantic break because uber-reliever Mason Miller wasn’t asked to pitch the ninth, and in his stead, it was really bad reliever Dany Jimenez, who somehow, already, has -0.5 fWAR this year. But, after an Olson leadoff double, the Braves managed just two flyouts. Duvall was the last hope and hooked a would-be game-tying homer foul by a few feet, and then struck out looking on a hanging slider to end the game.

In this game, the Braves had eight barrels. Those doubles went for one single, one double, one homer, and five outs. As a reminder, even this season, the rate of barrels becoming hits is a bit above two-in-three, and the rate of barrels becoming homers is about 45 percent. The Braves, instead, managed 38 percent and 13 percent, respectively. The Athletics, meanwhile, managed two doubles and two homers on their four barrels. That makes this loss probably one of the toughest of the season, not just because the Braves were massively favored to win a Chris Sale-Aaron Brooks matchup, but because offensively, they executed about as well as they have all year. You can’t do anything about wind and balls with more drag and the like, and the Braves are still in a fine place for the moment, but eventually they’re going to run out of time in terms of losses like this not really mattering. Thankfully, they have plenty of time, and maybe they’ve turned the corner are going to go back to barreling balls with impunity. I just hope they don’t maintain their incredibly stupid, worst-in-MLB homer-to-barrel ratio.