Braves follow Mets sweep by losing series in Miami

“We didn’t win the series, so there were a lot of things (that went wrong),” manager Brian Snitker said.

A 2-2 game through 4-1/2 innings, the Marlins tagged Bryce Elder for two runs on four hits in the fifth, his third time facing their lineup. He remained in the game to start the sixth, surrendering a double to Nick Fortes. After a sacrifice bunt, he gave way to Dylan Dodd, who gave up a bloop single to Xavier Edwards that made it a two-run game.

The Braves’ offense is not performing at a level to erase multi-run deficits these days. It tagged familiar foe Sandy Alcantara for three runs, but the unit produced one hit against the three Marlins relievers who followed.

Elder needed a better outing than getting charged with five runs on 10 hits. This embodied the usual troublesome Elder outing with some bad batted-ball luck and hard contact (Jesus Sanchez’s triple in the fifth came off the bat at 111 mph, the hardest hit of the game).

This was Elder’s first start since June 13. He’s often dealt with a sporadic schedule in his career, such is the life of a player who hasn’t established himself as a rotation regular, but he won’t use that to excuse any struggles.

“You know, you can look at it as much as you want – obviously, (with the type of pitcher I am), I’d like to be on a regular rotation; but guess what, that wasn’t an option this week,” Elder said. “They wanted me to pitch when they wanted me to pitch, and my job is to give us a chance to win a game. I didn’t do that. That’s part of it.”

Elder’s low velocity has always given him a smaller margin for error. He just didn’t have enough in the later portion of his outing. For those wondering why manager Brian Snitker let Elder face the Marlins lineup a third time, Snitker said he wanted to his starter to cover another inning. The Braves are in a stretch of 13 games without an off day and their rotation is down ace Chris Sale after he suffered a fractured left ribcage.

“You’ve got to try to cover innings,” Snitker said. “That’s their job”

Consider this another missed opportunity for a club that’s had many. The Braves appeared to be finding the consistency that’d eluded them for so long, winning three straight series including sweeping the Mets. Going from an emotional series against New York to the loanDepot Park doldrums, ahead of facing the Mets again, made this situation ripe for a letdown.

But one nevertheless should’ve expected the Braves to win the series against a team that had lost six of its past seven series.

“We got on a roll last week,” Elder said. “I thought we played some good baseball, it’s not like we played terribly, we just lost two out of three. So I think we can pick it back up tomorrow and take two or three in New York and be right back on the horse.”

The Braves begin a crucial four-game series in New York on Monday, just days after the Braves swept the Mets at Truist Park. The Braves have announced their probable pitchers as Spencer Schwellenbach (Monday), Spencer Strider (Tuesday), Didier Fuentes (Wednesday) and Grant Holmes (Thursday).