Atlanta Braves Morning Chop: Braves get a win in rare fashion

You may have heard of ‘winning ugly’, but the Braves took that to a whole new level in Sunday afternoon’s contest.

We do not complain about wins.  Wins are always difficult and always appreciated.  That’s so more more the case against a tough opponent, but what the Atlanta Braves pulled off on Sunday rises to ‘epic proportions.’

First, though, let’s get through the synopsis of the important bits that came to pass on Sunday:

• the Braves won, making this a 2 of 3 series win vs. Milwaukee
• the Phillies lost, giving them a 2 of 3 series loss vs. the Padres
• While the two teams are now tied for first place, the Braves still have 2 games in hand (part of their late Summer grind with few days off; plus also 4 games in hand to Milwaukee)
• the Phils now cross the country to play the Boston Red Sox (16-5 since All-Star Break) starting on Tuesday
• the Braves continue their homestand with a day/night double dip today vs. the Marlins (7-13 since ASB and losers in 8 of their last 10)
• The Nationals, meanwhile, blew a 3-0 lead in the bottom of the 9th on national TV via a grand slam walkoff, courtesy of the Cubs.  The Nats lose 2 of 3 and fall to 5½ games back.

A very good Sunday indeed.

The Good Stuff… and Ugly Stuff

So how did this Braves’ win come about?

THE HITTING

The Braves only got 9 hits, but nearly all of them counted.

• Doubles:  Freddie Freeman (2 on the day).
• Triples:  1½ (Nick Markakis).  Dansby Swanson added a ‘Little League’ triple via an error.
• Home Runs:  Acuña Jr. (15th), Swanson (9th), and Albies (21st… to match his age).
• 2 out RBI:  4 of the Braves’ runs scored with 2 outs in their innings.
• Only left 4 on base.

THE PITCHING

It’s here that the ugly part came in, and whether this causes issue for the double-header remains to be seen.

• Sean Newcomb had almost nothing working… slogged through 4 innings and 96 pitches, giving up 5 runs on twelve hits.
• 4 relief pitchers combined for the remaining 5 innings
• Luke Jackson was on the edge, giving up 2 runs on 4 hits
• Milwaukee had a total of 24 base-runners over their 9 innings and left 13 of them on base.
• Brewers 2-out RBI?  Only 1.

THE DEFENSE

Three double plays and 2 run-down outs contributed to the Brewers’ woes… while bailing out the Braves with a lot less damage than they should have endured.  This could easily have been a 15+ run outburst day by Milwaukee.

• Two runners were thrown out trying to steal
• One of those run-down outs occurred between 3rd and home.

The Epic Stuff

You still night not have an appreciation for just how rare Sunday’s game was.  Let’s help with that:

We (Fred Owens contributed greatly here) did some digging:

Here’s my contributions… which overlap his work a bit.

• July 27, 1932:  Cleveland Indians defeat the Yankees 12-10 despite being out-hit 21-9 (second game of a double-header).
• June 28, 1923:  The Philadelphia Phillies beat the Brooklyn Robins (later Dodgers) 8-7 in a game that they were out-hit 19-14.
• On July 24, 1931, those same Robins lost again by an 8-7 count… this time to the Pirates with the home-standing Pittsburgh team being outhit 21-13.

We went through the logs from baseball-reference.com’s Play Index tool (subscription required) and tried to find an instance the following was true (tracing back to 1908):

• a team won a ball game while being out-hit by at least 10 hits
  • You could also add ‘1 team had over twice the hits of the other’ at some level
• the game went 9 innings (or less)
• the losing team recorded at least 19 hits

The only such prior game appears to be that Indians/Yankees game from 1932.  Now add in this extra element:

• the losing team scores less than 10 runs

It appears this Braves-Brewers contest stands alone here.  All other cases feature results where a losing team scored more times or didn’t out-hit their opponent  by this much.

Given the fight that these teams are both waging, Milwaukee could be pointing to this date as “the one that got away” if they end up 1 game short in the Wild Card race… or especially if they end up as a second (road) Wild Card team.

Weird that this 8-7 score keeps coming up.

This outcome wasn’t the only thing that the Braves have done lately that few others have done… Ronald Acuña robbing a homer, then hitting a homer in the same inning is one of those (from early last week).

A player hitting into a double play, yet still reaching 1st base safely (Jose Bautista from the most recent Braves-Mets’ series) is another.

But this win over the Brewers?  It’s about as unique an outcome as you will find.

Don’t miss these Braves games… you never know what’s gonna happen.