It’s silly to make too much of any series, especially a series in Great American Ball Park. But it’s June. What else is there to discuss? OTAs? LIV? NIL?
· The Reds have hit 49 home runs in 41 home games, 29 in 37 road games. Opponents have hit 68 homers – yow! – over 41 games in Cincinnati. The Braves just hit 10 in 27 innings.
· The Braves, who entered the weekend having won eight consecutive games, led the Reds, who’d won 11 in succession, by at least three runs in all three games. They won two of three, if only just. They scored 24 runs. They yielded 23.
· To reiterate: The Braves destroy bad pitching. The Reds’ ERA is 4.98, fourth-worst in MLB. The only teams below them are the Royals, who have lost 56 games; the Rockies, who play half their games at altitude, and the A’s, on pace to finish a rounded-up 41-121. The Braves went 39-for-116 (.336) over three games. The Braves are hitting .271 on the season.
· The Braves yielded 23 runs over 26 innings. That’s an ERA of 7.96. Their ERA on arrival in Cincy was 3.69.
· The Braves lead the majors with 139 home runs. Next-best are the Dodgers with 124. It would be fun to see what this offense could do if it played 81 games in Cincinnati. It would be less fun for this pitching staff. The Braves’ three weekend starters – AJ Smith-Shawver, Jared Shuster and Charlie Morton – allowed 12 runs in 12 innings.
· The Braves’ relievers – they deployed four on Friday and Saturday, five on Sunday – yielded nine runs over 14 innings.
· Closer Raisel Iglesias earned two saves. His two-inning totals: four hits, two runs, two home runs, four strikeouts. The series ended when Igelsias, with the tying run at third and one out, induced Kevin Newman to hit into a double play. Whew.
· Braves manager Brian Snitker, speaking to reporters on Sunday: “I don’t know that I’ve ever been this exhausted after a series.”
· Seven Braves have hit 10 or more home runs. Orlando Arcia, Michael Harris, Travis d’Arnaud and Kevin Pillar have each hit six. The 2018 Yankees had a record 12 players hit 10-plus homers.
· The Braves are on pace to hit 292 homers. The National League record is 279 by the 2019 Dodgers.
· I’ve become a bit of a bore regarding Ozzie Albies, but indulge me again. Matt Olson is tied for the big-league lead with Shohei Ohtani at 25 home runs. Albies is tied for ninth with 18. He leads MLB second baseman with 55 RBIs.
· The Braves are 26-12 in road games. That’s the best in the bigs.
· FanGraphs gives the Braves a 21.9% chance of winning the World Series. Only the Rays (14.2%) are assigned, odds-wise, even half that much.
· The Braves are on pace to win 105 games. The franchise record is 106, set by the 1998 Braves, who somehow lost to Sterling Hitchcock in the NLCS.
· The Braves are on pace to win 105 games – yes, I just said that – having gotten 10 starts and 44-2/3 innings from Max Fried and Kyle Wright, who last season provided 60 starts and 365-2/3 innings.
· The Braves lead the National League East by eight games. That’s the biggest divisional lead. The Marlins and Phillies are 7-3 over their past 10 and have lost two games in the standings. Back to FanGraphs: The Braves have a 95.9% chance of winning the East.
· The Mets trail the Braves by 15 games. The Mets’ payroll is $131 million more than the Braves’. Eleven teams don’t have a payroll of $131M.
· The Mets – I’m an even bigger bore re: the Flushing crew – lost in Philadelphia on Sunday. Trailing 6-3, the Phillies scored four runs in the eighth inning on one hit. Mets relievers walked three and plunked two. Rookie third baseman Brett Baty botched a double play. Manager Buck Showalter was ejected in the ninth, doubtless because he’d seen enough.
· Back to the Reds. Snitker’s summation: “I’m glad we don’t see them anymore. Or the next time we see them, it’d be OK.” He meant in the playoffs. Imagine an NLCS with three games in the Cincinnati bandbox.
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