Conley’s gem ends Braves win streak at six

It had to end sometime for Atlanta, and the Braves season-long win streak ends at six after a 3-0 loss in Miami.

Like most everything good in this world, winning streaks end. For the Atlanta Braves, Wednesday’s loss to Miami not only snapped a season-best six-game winning streak—which was the longest current streak in the majors entering play—it brought to mind some of the same struggles we’ve seen over and over this year.

Can’t Bring ‘Em In

Atlanta is hitting .244 with runners in scoring position in 2016, a number that drops to .236 without run-producer extraordinaire Mallex Smith.

Against Miami, they had multiple opportunities early to bring home a man, but couldn’t get the job done:

• Jace Peterson leads off the game with a single and advances to third on a groundout and wild pitch. Freddie Freeman strikes out swinging and Jeff Francoeur grounds out.
• Erick Aybar leads off the third inning with a single and moves into scoring position following a John Gant bunt. Peterson and Ender Inciarte ground out weakly to first.
• Aybar laces a two-out double in the fifth, but Gant lines out to a sliding Ichiro to end the frame. Since his return, Aybar is hitting .345, with five doubles against just seven strikeouts and the whole league seems to have beef since he’s been hit twice pitches and seen numerous fastballs come inside.
• Back-to-back two-out singles from Nick Markakis and A.J. Pierzynski brought Chase d’Arnaud up as the tying run in the ninth. I don’t feel it’s a massive spoiler to reveal that didn’t go all that well.

Credit Adam Conley for pitching brilliantly for the Fish—he scattered four hits over eight, it’s not like he was out here loading the bases every inning—but he also wasn’t blowing anyone away and for as often as he was around the zone it felt like Atlanta, it’s curious how many first-pitch swings the Braves took (11, by my count), leading directly to quick outs or early count deficits.

(Again, not taking away anything from Conley here—his GameScore was 82, the second-best by a hurler against the Braves this year. I just thought a lot of the early swings put him in a better position than he deserved.)

Crooked Numbers

Three runs are not what you typically call a ‘big inning’, but when the offense gets stuck in neutral as often as Atlanta’s does, anytime a crooked number goes on the board, it’s cause for concern. Miami only got to John Gant once in this one, but it came to the tune of three runs in the second inning, two off a mammoth Justin Bour home run and the third a Jeff Mathis single. The damage might have been more severe had Francoeur not gunned down Chris Johnson trying to advance to third on Mathis’ single.

(We should probably all get together, raise some money and see if we can’t get Justin Bour to go to Tahiti or come down with a 72-hour flu the next time Atlanta plays Miami. In 19 career games against the Braves, he’s hitting .339 with six home runs.)

Gant was more than adequate, settling in to scatter seven hits over 5.2 innings, but the three-spot proved to be the difference.

Down Quick

At 5-29 when trailing after six innings, we’ve generally had a pretty decent idea of whether or not Atlanta is going to threaten after a couple times through the order. Going down three early and never threatening early spelled doom yet again for Atlanta.

Thankfully, we can see the cavalry coming in some cases. Tyrell Jenkins made his big league debut in the eighth, working a scoreless inning and surrendering only a two-out single to Marcell Ozuna. Aybar and Peterson continue a mini-resurgence (maybe not something to throw a party over, but given how much both struggled early, still cause for mild celebration) and Ian Krol continues to throw well, tossing 1.1 scoreless innings—he’s now allowed just one earned in his last seven appearances.

Since this wasn’t that fun, here’s d’Arnaud serenading Francoeur for no reason at all.

Next: Ken Rosenthal Contradicts Himself

The Matt’s (Harvey and Wisler) are scheduled to do battle Thursday in the opener of a four-gamer between the surgent(ish) Braves and tumbling(ish) Mets. 7:10 p.m. (ET) is your first pitch.