SAN FRANCISCO – If anyone figured the Braves would catch a break this series with Giants ace Madison Bumgarner on the disabled list, Ty Blach had other ideas.
Blach, the rookie left-hander filling in for the big lefty, did something of a Bumgarner impersonation by taking a three-hit shutout to the eighth inning in a 6-3 Giants win Saturday night before the 512th consecutive sellout crowd at AT&T Park.
While Blach was dealing, Braves starter Mike Foltynewicz was reeling.
Foltynewicz (3-5) gave up five runs and seven hits in just four innings, including a two-run, two-out homer by Rick Hundley in the second inning and a leadoff homer by Brandon Belt in the three-run fourth inning. His ERA climbed from 3.86 to 4.44, leaving the Braves with only one starter, Friday’s winning pitcher Jaime Garcia, with an ERA below 4.17.
“Everything was up in the zone – fastball, slider, even the change-up tonight,” said Foltynewicz, who has allowed eight home runs in his past six starts including three two-homer games. “They were ready for anything that was in the zone and they did what they had to do with it.”
The loss was just the sixth in 16 games for the Braves, who need a win in Sunday’s series finale to keep alive a streak of no series losses in their past five. They have three series wins and two splits in that span.
Blach’s hits allowed total doubled in eighth inning, but he still finished with an impressive line: 7 2/3 innings, six hits, two runs, three walks and five strikeouts. Just the fourth lefty starter the Braves have faced all season, he didn’t overpower, but had hitters off-balance with a mix of well-located 91-93 mph fastballs, change-ups, sliders and curveballs.
“We made a run at it late,” Braves manager Brian Snitker said. “Just one of them days again where we got too far down and too early. The bullpen did a good job of holding the game in check for us, but we just had trouble with the lefty (Blach). That’s the first time we’ve seen that this year, that type of left-hander. Guys like that can give you trouble.”
Blach (3-2) made seven starts since replacing Bumgarner and has pitched well in six of them. He gave up eight earned runs in three innings of a start in the bandbox ballpark at Cincinnati, but is 3-1 with a 2.21 ERA in his other six starts.
The 26-year-old rookie had a three-hitter going and a 5-0 lead until the eighth inning, when the Braves got two runs on three consecutive hits from Rio Ruiz, Ender Inciarte and Brandon Phillips and an RBI groundout from Nick Markakis, who hustled to prevent a double play. The initial ruling was a double play, but the call was overturned upon review.
Ruiz started the rally with a one-out pinch-hit double off the left-field wall. He wasn’t in the lineup at third base because Snitker wanted another right-handed bat in the lineup against Blach, who limited lefty batters to a .146 average and .417 OPS before Saturday, compared to a .287 average and .821 OPS by right-handers.
He was tough against everyone Saturday. Before the eighth inning, the only hits off Blach were three singles, two on the ground and the other a bloop single. Catcher Tyler Flowers had two of those hits.
“Don’t take anything away from him, he pitched well,” Flowers said of Blach. “He was getting ahead of guys, changing speeds, made big pitches when he had to.”
Blach was replaced after the Markakis ground-out in the eighth, and Matt Kemp greeted reliever Derek Law with a double that put two Braves in scoring position for Matt Adams, the hot-hitting newcomer who has been a worthy fill-in for injured Braves slugger Freddie Freeman.
Adams represented the potential tying run, but the rally ended when he grounded out to first base to end the inning.
Braves reliever Ian Krol gave up a run in the eighth on two walks and Hundley’s RBI single, and the Braves got a run in the ninth on an RBI triple from Danny Santana.
Santana got his first start at third base for the Braves and bobbled a ground ball in the second inning with one out, eliminating a potential double play. He had to settle for one out on the play, and Hundley followed with his homer for the first two runs of the game.
“That’s all part of the game. You’ve still got to make pitches,” Snitker said of the Santana miscue. “Everybody that comes up there, you’ve got to make pitches. When he bobbled it a little bit that probably took any shot at the double play, but you’ve still got to keep going after guys and making pitches, because that’s the nature of the game.”
After Belt’s leadoff homer in the fourth, Foltynewicz struck out the next two batters, then gave up four consecutive hits, the third of which was a critical mistake: a 2-2 fastball to Blach, who lined it up the middle for an RBI single. Denard Span followed with an RBI double.
“It was pretty middle and pretty belt-high,” Flowers said of Foltynewicz’s pitch to Blach. “That’s just another example of, you’ve got to hit spots. Even pitchers, athletic pitchers, can jump on it when tbey know it’s coming.”
What made the Blach hit all the tougher to swallow was the fact that Foltynewicz was ahead in the count 0-2 before throwing two pitches for balls and the 93-mph fastball over the middle.
“The feel for his secondary stuff wasn’t real good tonight, the location of it and command of it, the whole thing,” Snitker said. “Biggest thing I can point to, you get that pitcher (Blach) out and you’re in the game. We’re still in the game, (Foltynewicz) is still in the game. For me, that was probably the biggest at-bat of the night right there.”
Foltynewicz agreed and said, “That happened in the past when I faced San Diego a couple of years ago and (pitcher James) Shields did the same thing to me. It was just kind of a mental lapse. Kind of gave in, and especially with one right down the middle it’s going to get hit, even if it’s a pitcher. That was really kind of the downfall of everything.”
