Another week, another opponent celebrating a playoff berth-clinching win over the Braves at Turner Field.
Seven days after the Nationals showered in champagne following a win that clinched the National League East title, the Pirates celebrated Tuesday night after a 3-2 win over the Braves that clinched at least a wild-card spot for Pittsburgh when coupled with Milwaukee’s earlier loss to Cincinnati.
The Pirates clinched with their 15th win in 21 September games, while the Braves wasted another strong start by Alex Wood and fell to a majors-worst 4-16 for the month, assuring themselves of a .500 or worse season by slipping to 76-81 with five games left.
They’ve lost five in a row and totaled just 17 runs while losing 10 of their past 11, a miserable finish that won’t soon be forgotten. They’re in third-place tie with the Mets in the NL East, just a half-game ahead of the Marlins.
“It stinks,” third baseman Chris Johnson said. “We have a lot of guys in here who don’t want to feel like this again. So hopefully in the offseason guys will work hard and come back in and try to make it so we’re out there celebrating, not everybody else.”
Pirates starter Gerrit Cole (11-5) was dominant for most of his seven innings, retired the last 17 batters he faced to win his fourth consecutive start and improve to 8-1 with a 2.94 ERA in 10 September starts over the past two seasons. He allowed two runs, four hits and two walks with eight strikeouts.
The Braves scored a run in each of the first two innings for a 2-0 lead before Cole went into shutdown mode, recording 18 outs in the last 17 batters he faced beginning with Andrelton Simmons’ bases-loaded double play in the second inning.
Wood (11-11) had another quality start with a loss to show for the effort, allowing seven hits, three runs (two earned) and two walks with six strikeouts in 6 2/3 innings.
“I thought he was terrific,” said manager Fredi Gonzalez, whose Braves lead the majors with 109 quality starts, seven more than they had last year when they won 96 games and the NL East crown. “I don’t think you can ask for anything more than that. He gave us a good chance to win the game.”
The Pirates got an unearned run after Christian Bethancourt’s throwing error in the fourth inning, a game-tying homer by Travis Snider on the first pitch of the fifth, and the winning run on doubles by Andrew McCutchen and Starling Marte in the sixth.
Wood has a 1.92 ERA in his past 11 starts, but only a 4-3 record in that span, with the Braves scoring two or fewer runs while he was in eight of those 11 games. Nevertheless, he blamed no one but himself.
“Any time we score early, no matter what the situation, it is always nice,” he said. “You’d like to be able to bear down a little bit more than I did. I made a couple of mistakes. The one to Snider — you can’t miss big. Up here, you’ve got to miss small and that was a really big miss to Snider and he made me pay for it.”
Pittsburgh still has an outside shot at catching St. Louis in the NL Central, and has two games left in a four-game series at Turner Field. The Pirates clinched a spot in the postseason for the second year in a row, and did it exactly one year after clinching a playoff berth last season.
Freddie Freeman’s one-out RBI double in the first inning put the Braves ahead 1-0, their first lead in five games since Wednesday’s 3-1 win against the Mets, and their first run in the first inning since Jason Heyward’s leadoff homer against the Mets on Aug. 27.
Freeman was out trying to advance to third on the throw home on the play, which stung a bit when Justin Upton followed with a single. Gonzalez didn’t have any issue with Freeman trying to make something happen for the stagnant Braves.
“Play at the plate with a possible run, trying to get the extra base and we get thrown out,” Gonzalez said. “I’m OK with that stuff, when you are not scoring runs and you are trying to be aggressive on the base paths. I really am.”
The Braves pushed the lead to 2-0 in the second when Simmons hit a double play with the bases loaded and none out, after a leadoff walk by Heyward and singles by Bethancourt and Johnson, the latter hit caroming off Cole’s glove. Wood struck out to end the inning.
“We had the bases loaded,” Gonzalez said. “Double play killed that rally and then (Wood) came up. We had, what, three double plays turned against us? We had some people on base, we just couldn’t put a crooked number up.”
Simmons has grounded into 25 double plays, third-most in the majors. An inning later, he made a sensational catch on a liner to his left, diving for the ball and holding onto it when he face-planted upon landing.
And so we saw both sides of the Simmons coin in a span of 10 minutes – disappointing offense, splendid defense.
Although the Braves had a 2-0 lead after two innings, they failed to fully capitalize after getting four hits and two walks in those innings. It would come back to haunt them when Cole settled into a groove and Pirates hitters started finding holes and driving balls to the gaps.
The Pirates cut the lead to 2-1 in the fourth on the costly mistake by rookie Bethancourt. With runners on the corners, two outs and two strikes on Gabby Sanchez, Bethancourt tried to throw out Marte stealing second. The throw was wide right and allowed McCutchen to score from third base.
