The Braves gave up five home runs and won Friday and turned five double plays and lost Saturday.
Or, the Braves hit the canvas Saturday as soon as Sugar Ray missed with his second punch, er, pitch.
One could’ve been cute or flippant in chronicling Saturday’s game against the Blue Jays, but the Braves could be excused for not being in any mood for it after blowing a 4-0 lead, not getting a call they felt should’ve been reversed on replay, and losing 6-5 on Josh Donaldson’s 10th-inning walk-off homer against Sugar Ray Marimon.
After Braves setup man Jim Johnson gave up a homer in a two-run eighth inning for the second consecutive game (this time to Jose Bautista), Kelly Johnson answered with a tying homer in the ninth.
But the Blue Jays took full advantage of a mismatch in the 10th.
Marimon was called up last week from Triple-A Gwinnett and previously made only one four-inning mop-up appearance before a sparse crowd at Turner Field after Trevor Cahill got rocked in the first three innings Tuesday.
Donaldson hit two of the Blue Jays’ five homers in Friday’s thrilling series opener, which the Braves won 8-7.
This was a rookie right-hander vs. a guy who finished in the top 10 in the American League MVP balloting the past two seasons.
“We considered a lot of stuff, but that was our best option,” said Braves manager Fredi Gonzalez, who didn’t want to use effective rookie Cody Martin because he threw 25 pitches Friday.
So the Braves went with Marimon. And a crowd of 34,743 — impressive, given the Raptors’ NBA playoff opener taking place a few blocks away — went giddy after Donaldson pounced on a hanging change-up and drove it over the left-field wall, handing the Braves their fourth loss in 11 games, third in the past four, and first in a game when they scored first.
“A loss is a loss,” said Freddie Freeman, whose two-out, two-run homer off knuckleballer R.A. Dickey in the third inning pushed the lead to 3-0 and gave Freeman homers in consecutive games and four in the past seven games.
“We swung the bats well; we pitched well. Just made a couple of mistakes here and there. But we battled, kept coming back, Kelly had a huge home run to keep us in it. Overall it was a good game, they just came out on top.”
A.J. Pierzynski homered again for the Braves, the third for the 38-year-old backup catcher in his five games played. And Nick Markakis had three walks and a single to make it nine consecutive plate appearances in which he reached base to start the series — he was 4-for-4 with a walk Friday — before making an out in the ninth inning.
But the second eventful slugfest of the series ended with Blue Jays pouring on the field and the Braves trudging off, some wondering “what if?”
As in, what if Dalton Pompey had been called out instead of safe on a close play at first base with two out in the seventh inning, when shortstop Andrelton Simmons fielded Pompey’s grounder as a runner raced home from third. Simmons fired a fastball to first baseman Freddie Freeman that arrived either a split-second before or at the same time that the speedy, lunging Pompey’s foot hit the base. First-base ump Tom Hallion called him safe.
The Braves challenged the call, but replays didn’t provide what umpires deemed conclusive evidence to overturn it. Steve Tolleson, whose two-out triple had driven in the second run of the inning, scored on the Pompey single to trim the lead to 4-3.
“There were a lot of plays made, including the one they probably didn’t get right,” said Braves pitcher Alex Wood, who induced four inning-ending double-play grounders in the first five innings and had a shutout going until the seventh. “But it’s awesome how they get behind me and nine guys battled the whole game from start to finish.”
Asked if he had seen the replay of The Play, Wood said, “Yeah, I mean, everybody saw it. I don’t need to talk about it. You guys watched the game, you saw instant replay on TV. It’s … I’m still kind of at a loss.”
Four of nine hits allowed by Wood came in the seventh, and he was replaced after the Pompey hit. Wood got no decision and is 5-3 with a 2.31 ERA over his past 14 starts since late July, allowing three earned runs or fewer allowed in each start and lasting at least six innings in 13 of the 14.
In his past two starts, the young lefty has allowed a total of 17 hits, after not allowing more than seven in his previous 12 starts.
