The Braves defeated the Marlins 9-4 Wednesday, but they had a scare with their left-handed ace.
Max Fried left his start after one inning with a tweaked left ankle. The team said the move was precautionary. Fried sustained the injury while fielding a Starling Marte bunt in the top of the first.
“They’re checking him out,” manager Brian Snitker said after the game. “He tweaked it a bit on that bunt. He was down in the dugout, and it was like, ‘I’ll give it a try.’ And I said, ‘If you don’t think you can go, we’re not going to screw around with anything like that.’ Because that’s all he needed to do was go out there and try to get by and hurt his arm or something. We’ll check him out tomorrow and go from there.”
Fried was unavailable to speak with reporters following the game because he was receiving treatment away from Truist Park.
After Fried recorded the first two outs, the second of which came on the bunt, the Marlins homered off him back-to-back times. Fried went 55-2/3 innings without allowing a home run this season - the longest streak in the majors - before Jesus Aguilar and Brian Anderson hit back-to-back blasts. His homerless run spanned 68-1/3 innings dating back to last season.
Wednesday was Fried’s final tune-up before the postseason when, if healthy, he’s expected to start Game 1 of the best-of-three wild-card round next week at Truist Park. This was Fried’s second outing since returning from the 10-day injured list with a back injury that cost him one start. Ideally, he would’ve logged a heavier workload Wednesday with a week until his next outing.
Snitker was optimistic that Fried avoided a serious injury, but he said the team would know more later Wednesday night and Thursday.
“The preliminaries are good, but we’ll know more (later) tonight," he said. "He was walking around gingerly a little bit. We didn’t want to take any chances. … I think it will be fine. Tomorrow, we’ll see where he’s at and plan from there.”
Fried, 26, finishes his breakout season with a 7-0 record, a 2.25 ERA with a 50:19 strikeout-to-walk ratio in 11 starts (56 innings). The left-hander carried a decimated rotation, providing the only bit of reliability and consistency the Braves received from the group. He’ll be among the crowded field of National League Cy Young award contenders.
