Braves beat Brewers to win MLB Little League Classic

WILLIAMSPORT, Pa. — At this juncture, the Braves will take a win any which way they can get it.

Another strong start from newcomer Tyler Mahle and some Brewers miscues helped the Braves, who had lost seven of nine, win 4-2 on Sunday at Bowman Field in the MLB Little League Classic.

The Braves (76-55) get a day off Monday after playing seven games in seven days in four different cities, a trip which saw the team go 2-5. Getting a win in front of the participating teams in the Little League World Series added some icing to the victory cake.

“I think it’s a reminder for big leaguers why they started playing the game, because it’s easy to forget when you do it for a living, and the stakes are high, the pressure’s high,” Braves manager Walt Weiss said. “Sometimes you need those reminders of how guys started playing the game. I think today is a perfect example of that.”

Mahle had given up only one run in five innings when he allowed a leadoff single to Andrew Vaughn in the sixth. Mahle got Christian Yelich to hit a potential double-play to first, but Matt Olson’s throw to second when off the helmet of Vaughn and caromed into left field.

Didier Fuentes came in and put out the fire, though, getting a 4-6-3 double play and grounder to second for the third out.

Mahle’s line read one earned run in five innings of work. He struck out four and walked two while throwing 94 pitches and giving up six hits. Since being acquired from the Giants at the trade deadline at the start of August, Mahle has a 1.52 ERA in four starts with the Braves.

Fuentes preserved Mahle’s lead by working around two singles to complete a scoreless seventh. Dylan Lee allowed a run in the eighth on pinch-hitter Luis Lara’s RBI triple with two outs.

Closer Raisel Iglesias got pinch-hitter Gary Sánchez to pop up to short to end the eighth.

Michael Harris II picked up Lee by belting a solo home run off Brewers reliever Aaron Ashby to begin the ninth inning. It was Harris’ 21st home run, a career high in this his fifth MLB season.

“It was it was good to close this out and go into the off day and refresh a little bit,” Harris said. “It’s always good to win.”

Iglesias didn’t make it easy on himself in the bottom of the ninth, walking the leadoff man and giving up a single. But he got a fly out to deep right center and a 1-6-3 double play to end it for his 27th save.

“It’s a hard-fought win,” Weiss said. “It’s a tough team to put away. The ball’s always in play. So you gotta defend, and we did tonight. You got to play well. If you give that team extra outs, we did that the other night in Milwaukee, it’s going to cost you because they’re good at keeping the line moving. We had to play well.”

Mauricio Dubón gave Mahle and the Braves the lead in the second inning with a one-out ground-rule double into the right field corner. A walk to Austin Riley loaded the bases after that, but Sean Murphy popped out to first, and Harris struck out to end the inning.

Fortunately for the Braves, and thanks to Ronald Acuña Jr., the Brewers (81-50) also left the bases loaded in the bottom of that inning when Acuna made a sliding catch in shallow right to rob Brewers third baseman David Hamilton of an RBI.

“A little wild, but battled through some at-bats,” Mahle said of his outing. “Then the defense was right there behind me and made some of those big plays.”

Mahle (5-10) wasn’t as fortunate in the third, giving up a two-out RBI single to right to Jake Bauers that tied the game at 1-1.

The Braves nearly squandered a golden opportunity to score in the fourth. They quickly had runners at the corners with nobody out before Brewers starter Shane Drohan retired the next two batters and looked like he would get out of the jam when Sean Murphy hit a slow chopper to third.