Braves rookie Williams Perez settled down after a rocky first inning Monday, but there was no settling down for veteran reliever Nick Masset.
Masset got absolutely pummeled by the Los Angeles Dodgers, giving up four runs and three home runs in the eighth inning of a 6-3 Braves loss at Dodger Stadium to open a three-game series and 10-game trip.
Masset, signed by the Braves a week ago after being designated for assignment by the Miami Marlins, gave up as many homers in a six-batter span in the eighth as he allowed in 51 appearances (45 innings) last season – and that was with the Rockies, who play in one of the most hitter-friendly ballparks in baseball history.
“It’s definitely an embarrassment,” said Massett, who hadn’t given up a homer in 26 innings over his past 25 appearances going back to mid-August. ” I feel like I let my team down, No. 1. There’s nothing worse than going out there and blowing a lead and getting a big, fat ‘L.’”
After Luis Avilan gave up the tying run on two walks and a hit in the seventh, Masset induced a groundball out to avoid further damage that inning. But he gave up a leadoff homer in the eighth to Andre Ethier. One out and one walk later, he gave up a homer to pinch-hitter Alex Guerrero.
Two batters later he gave up yet another long ball as Jimmy Rollins homered before the Braves pulled the plug on Masset’s third appearance in an Atlanta uniform.
Braves manager Fredi Gonzalez said he had planned to rest closer Jason Grilli after using him Saturday and Sunday, and wanted to have Masset get through the eighth inning and use rookie Brandon Cunniff in the ninth.
“With the lefty-righty splits and him having some history with Ethier, run him back out there,” Gonzalez said. “Again, you feel like you had a pretty good matchup with Ethier and with (Masset) getting left-handers out, and again with the bottom of that order. It didn’t materialize the way we wanted it to.”
Ethier had been 1-for-6 with three strikeouts against Masset, and lefties were 4-for-25 against Masset his season before Monday, when he gave up homers to a lefty (Ethier), a switch-hitter (Rollins) and Guerrero.
The Braves got a run in the ninth on two hits and a Christian Bethancourt RBI groundout.
Reduced to a footnote was an impressive, if erratic, performance by Perez. When the rookie labored through a 31-pitch first inning that included a bases-loaded walk, it didn’t look like he would be around long enough to reach a prescribed pitch limit, much less turn in a quality start.
But Perez worked out of bases-loaded jams in the first and third innings, lasting six innings and leaving with a 2-1 lead that put him in line for his first win in his second major league start.
Alas for the Braves, Avilan hasn’t been quite as good starting innings fresh as he has been at stranding inherited runners, where the left-hander excels. And Masset, well, he got rocked.
Perez limited the Dodgers to one run on seven hits and one with with seven strikeouts in six innings. He threw just 59 strikes in 106 pitches, but made big pitches when he needed them most, just as he did in his first start last week against the Cincinnati Reds.
He recorded 11 outs in his last 11 batters faced against the Dodgers, beginning with a bases-loaded double play grounder off the bat of Scott Van Slyke to end the third inning.
“So far I like the way he’s pitched and he’s progressed,” Gonzalez said of Perez, who has allowed 13 hits, two runs and two walks with 14 strikeouts in 11 innings as a starter. “Here’s a kid who only pitched (five) games in Triple-A before pitching here in the big leagues? So I’m thinking he’s doing a very nice job.”
It was Van Slyke who also popped out with bases loaded to end the first inning, on the first of two outstanding plays by second baseman Jace Peterson on balls in shallow right field.
In his start Wednesday against the Reds, Perez allowed one run on six hits and one walk in five innings, again with seven strikeouts including a few at the most opportune times. After throwing 79 pitches against the Reds in his first start in 2 ½ weeks since being called up from Triple-A, Gonzalez said before Monday’s game that Perez would be on roughly a 100-pitch limit.
He struggled in the first inning, when he gave up a leadoff double to Joc Pederson, then with two outs allowed an Adrian Gonzalez single and hit Justin Turner with a pitch to load the bases.
He walked Ethier to give the Dodgers a 1-0 lead, but from there Perez working out of trouble twice before getting on a roll and exiting with a lead after six innings in front of a fired-up crowd of 44,680.
“I wasn’t nervous; I was just a little too excited,” Perez said. “I was just missing with my pitches, but I was able to come back and make pitches and get out of it…. In the minor leagues I had problems with the first inning, where I’d give up a run or two and have a lot of guys in scoring position. But I battle through it and end up being OK.”
The Braves tied the score with a run in the fourth when Jonny Gomes singled and, one groundout later, scored on Pedro Ciriaco’s two-out single. Ciriaco started at third base in place of Albert Callaspo, a late scratch from the lineup after a team official called manager Fredi Gonzalez on Monday afternoon to let him know Callaspo could be traded.
An inning later, the Braves took a 2-1 lead when Cameron Maybin drew a one-out walk, went to second on a wild pitch by Dodgers starter Brett Anderson, and scored on Southern California native Freddie Freeman’s single past the defensive shift in right field.
