Max Fried didn’t have it. Everyone who came after him did. The Braves trailed Game 1 of their National League Division Series 4-1. They won 9-5. This tells us their offense finally got rolling; it also tells us this mighty bullpen did its bit yet again.
Fried was gone after four innings, his staple curveball having availed him little. That left five innings for these relievers to cover, and these relievers don’t just cover. They also smother. The members of this many-splendored ‘pen have worked 14 innings over three playoff games. Their collective ERA is 0.64. Their team is 3-0. Cause and effect.
Sandy Alcantara, the Marlins’ starting pitcher, wasn’t quite as dazzling as Cincinnati’s Trevor Bauer was in Game 1 of Round 1, but Alcantara exited in the seventh inning with his team ahead 4-3. He’s struck out eight. He also left two Braves aboard. By the time the Marlins' relievers registered the second out of the seventh, Miami trailed 9-4.
The Marlins have seen this before. Over the 2018 and 2019 regular seasons, the Braves hooked the Fish five times either in extra innings or on a walk-off. Miami is better now, but it doesn’t yet have a bullpen to match Atlanta’s. That’s not necessarily a criticism. Man for man, the Braves never have had a relief corps to match this. Put it this way: If the Braves of the ’90s had such a late-inning crew, we wouldn’t be griping about Only One World Series Win. We’d be waxing rhapsodic over eight World Series wins in a row.
The Braves pulled their starter early Tuesday and won breezing. The Marlins fell to pieces the moment Alcantara took his leave. That has been the modus operandi of the 2020 Braves. Even when they couldn’t find a healthy or effective starter for love or money, they still had these relievers. They still had these hitters, too.
You’d think the Marlins would have learned: When you plunk Ronald Acuna, you just make him mad. You also tick off Brian Snitker and the rest of his merry man. Miami pitchers have hit Acuna five times over three seasons, and even though the villainous Jose Urena isn’t on the postseason roster – he suffered a broken forearm in the regular-season finale – the memories linger.
Alcantara thunked a 97.5-mph fastball off Acuna’s hip with one out in the third and the Braves down 4-1. Acuna wasn’t pleased. Both benches were warned. (This also drives Snitker nuts. He believes Miami keeps taking a free shot at his young star, and his pitchers face expulsion if they respond, which didn’t stop Kevin Gausman from dusting Urena last year.)
Yes, Acuna had done a modest bat flip after leading off the first with a home run, but that’s part of his deal. He hits homers against other teams, but no other opponent takes it so personally. Said Acuna through an interpreter: “I looked over at their bench and was like, ‘It’s been five times.’ I guess I should be getting used to it.”
Said Snitker: “He hit a long homer and got hit with a 97. My reaction wasn’t good. I guarantee you (Alcantara) wasn’t trying to hit him, but you’ve got to be careful going in(side) like that. (The Marlins) keep dinging that kid; the middle of the plate is getting taken away from (Acuna).”
As for the Braves' two-run response to Acuna’s HBP, Snitker said: “I don’t think that hurt, for dang sure. It might have woke us up.”
The Notorious Ronald Acuña Jr. pic.twitter.com/ut4BZVSdG1
— MLB (@MLB) October 6, 2020
Acuna took out some frustration by running like mad to score on Marcell Ozuna’s double. That made the score 4-2. Travis d’Arnaud followed with another RBI double. There the game sat until the seventh, Darren O’Day and Tyler Matzek and Will Smith having allowed the Marlins next to nothing – three innings, four strikeouts, one single – with the Braves biding the time, waiting for the moment when Don Mattingly would summon one of his relievers.
That moment came. With two on and nobody out, Yimi Garcia induced Freddie Freeman to rap into a force-out. Ozuna’s single to left tied the score. D’Arnaud’s homer to center made the score 7-4. Dansby Swanson’s even more massive homer to center put the Braves up by five. Game over.
Said Snitker: “As long as we’ve got a strike left, we’re pretty dangerous.”
Chris Martin worked the eighth, yielding this bullpen’s first – and maybe last – run of the postseason. Mark Melancon struck out two in a 1-2-3 ninth. Snitker on his relievers: “They allowed us a chance to win that game.”
Then: “This really isn’t about the (new) three-batter rule. These are not matchup guys; they’re clean-inning guys. They can go out no matter who’s hitting. (The bullpen) has been well-constructed. Alex (Anthopoulos, the general manager) did a great job putting this together.”
A game going wrong wound up going right. A team that, this time a week ago, had lost nine consecutive opening games in postseason has now taken two in seven days. The Braves are one-third of the way to the NL Championship Series, a place they haven’t visited since 2001. They can hold a lead. They can re-take a lead when they’ve lost it. They look better than any Braves team has in any October this century.
Why, d’Arnaud was asked, did he choose to sign with the Braves over the winter? “Championship-caliber team,” he said. “Championship-caliber organization.” And now, one world-class bullpen.
