Riley, Baldwin each belt two homers in Braves’ win over Rangers

Drake Baldwin notched a career-high five hits and hit two homers, and Austin Riley belted two homers as part of a four-RBI day in the Braves’ 8-5, series-clinching win over the Rangers on Sunday at Truist Park.

Riley’s feat marked the first time since April 17 he had hit two homers in a game. His two-run single in the seventh also gave the Braves a late cushion.

“For me, it’s nice to finally you know see some of the work that I put in see some results there,” said Riley, who went 6-for-12 with three homers and five RBIs over the weekend.

Baldwin added three singles to his two solo homers for the first five-hit day of his young MLB tenure. He became the first Braves catcher to tally five hits since Johnny Estrada did so May 15, 2004.

Baldwin became one of seven Braves in the Atlanta era (since 1966) with at least five hits and two homers in a game, and the first to do so since Ozzie Albies on June 30, 2021.

On the mound, bullpen arms Dylan Dodd, Didier Fuentes, Dylan Lee and Raisel Iglesias, respectively, closed out the victory.

The Braves (57-41) won their 21st series of the season (matching their total from 2021), claimed their 12th series win at home, improved to 10-5 in rubber games and are now 48-1 when leading after eight innings. They also scored 29 runs in the three-game series against the AL West leaders.

“It’s nice to see that we’re kind of firing on all cylinders with the offense there,” Baldwin said. “Just kind of carrying that momentum forward, and it’s nice to get a series win there.”

In the bottom of the first inning Sunday, the Braves manufactured a run to take an early lead. A red-hot hitting Baldwin rolled a single into right on the first pitch from Rangers starter Nathan Eovaldi (9-8), then stole second, moved to third on a grounder to first and scored on Michael Harris II’s fly out to deep right field.

Riley banged his 11th home run of the season with one out in the second. His 416-foot shot to left gave the Braves a 2-0 lead and was the third baseman’s 180th home run of his career.

Baldwin lengthened the lead to three with a solo home run that started the third. He took a 2-2 curveball and launched it into the Braves’ bullpen for his 17th home run of the season.

Riley arrived to the plate with one out in the fourth and went deep again. This time, he took a 3-1 fastball down the center of the zone and sent it 413 feet over the wall in center field to put the Braves ahead 4-0.

After hitting .207 with an OPS of .618 before the All-Star break, Riley said he did a whole lot of nothing earlier this week during the team’s four off days.

“I actually didn’t do anything after the break. Just more of a mental break. That first half, it beat me up pretty good,” Riley said. “Just clear mind, working on a few things lower half. It’s not one thing. It’s a combination of things that we’ve been working on all season, and building the muscle memory. You can do the right moves in the cage, and everything looks right, and then you get out there, you’ll face 100 and it’s tough to repeat those movements without thinking about ‘em.

“When you’re thinking about, you know, mechanics and trying to hit 100, it’s hard. Being able to build some muscle memory there on a few things, and going out there and just focusing on what the pitcher’s trying to do, it’s encouraging.”

Braves starter Grant Holmes (6-4) was humming right along until he reached the fourth inning. A lead-off single by Nicky Lopez and one-out single by Joc Pederson preceded Wyatt Langford’s RBI double to the gap in left. Josh Jung got the Rangers (50-49) within 4-2 with a sacrifice fly to center field.

Jake Burger’s RBI single to left made it a 4-3 game.

Holmes got a grounder to third to end his day having allowed those three runs on seven hits. He walked two and threw 50 strikes out of his 74 pitches.