Braves Collapse Late, Dropping Sunday's Game to Dodgers

ESPN's Sunday Night Baseball got a show, as the top of the Dodgers lineup put this one to bed in the top of the 9th

The Atlanta Braves suffered a rare bullpen collapse, dropping their matchup with the Los Angeles Dodgers 9-2 on ESPN’s Sunday Night Baseball.

Here’s what you need to know about from the contest.

Morton continued his hot streak

Entering tonight’s matchup, veteran Charlie Morton was on the best streak of his season - a 2.88 ERA across his previous six starts, with 43 strikeouts in 34.1 innings.

The streak continues.

Morton went six innings, allowing just one run on three hits, striking out six and walking two. It was his second consecutive quality start against LA, after he allowed just two runs on five hits on May 3rd from Dodgers Stadium.

In a reversal of his normal process, Morton threw more fastballs (41) than curveballs (35) and got more whiffs on the heater (7) than his breaker (6). He finished with 14 total whiffs and a 31% CSW, not letting the top of LA’s order beat him - Shohei Ohtani, Mookie Betts, and Freddie Freeman combined for just one hit off of the veteran, although that was a RBI double by Ohtani in the 5th inning.

LA’s bats EXPLODED in the ninth

Through the first 80 outs recorded in this series by the Dodgers, they had scored a cumulative total of five runs.

But before logging their 81st out in Atlanta, they picked up seven more.

Raisel Iglesias, in the midst of a 35.1 IP scoreless streak, got a quick strikeout to open the 9th and then gave up a triple to Will Smith. After a groundout by Andy Pages was unable to bring in Smith and gave Atlanta hope that they might get out of the inning, the Dodgers exploded.

Getting vengeance for Atlanta intentionally walking Shohei Ohtani to get to him, Mookie Betts got an RBI single. Freddie Freeman also singled, scoring two because Jarred Kelenic let the groundball go under his glove and had to reverse course to go get it.

And then the floodgates opened.

LA hit three consecutive homers, the last two coming off of reliever John Brebbia, logging a total of seven two-out runs in the inning. Five went on the tally of Iglesias, raising his ERA from 1.16 to 1.87. Those were the first earned runs allowed by Iglesias since June 16th.

But let’s be clear, Atlanta lost this game

Despite LA’s offensive outburst in the 9th inning, Atlanta did more to lose this game than LA did to win this game.

Let me break it down.

The boxscore only shows one error, but it was a sloppy game. Dylan Lee inexplicably took a pitch clock violation in the 7th inning, putting Will Smith on base. He would come around to score, with Lee being tagged with the blown save after the game was tied.

The Braves had a chance to score in the 8th, after a leadoff walk and a double put runners on 2nd and 3rd with no outs.

Somehow, they didn’t.

Travis d’Arnaud, after swinging at multiple pitches out of the zone, weakly flew out to shallow left field, not deep enough to score pinch-runner Eli White from third base. Orlando Arcia then struck out on four pitches despite none of them being in the zone for the 2nd out, with Jarred Kelenic ending the inning with a three-pitch strikeout.

(At least all of those were in the zone, all 100+ fastballs from Michael Kopech.)

Once again tied with New York

The Mets dropped their Sunday afternoon matchup to the Phillies, with Philadelphia scoring in both the 8th and 9th for the walk-off victory.

With both teams losing, Atlanta’s back into a tie with the Mets for the final NL Wild Card spot.

What’s next for the Atlanta Braves?

The Braves wrap up the series and the homestand with one more matchup, and this one’s a doozy: Max Fried (9-9, 3.46) taking on Yoshinobu Yamamoto (6-2, 2.77) at 7:20 PM ET.