9 crucial moments that cost the Atlanta Braves a Sunday night win

Think baseball isn’t a game of inches? You may reconsider after seeing how many ways the Atlanta Braves might have beaten the Dodgers on Sunday night.

Many of us would think of a “close” game being decided by umpire calls or an error. In this case, though, the Atlanta Braves were done in by an uncanny number of “near misses” that all went against them.

In fact, if you only focus on Kenley Jansen‘s blown save… well, that’s probably neither giving him enough credit nor remembering all of the other details going on during the game.

Here’s what I’m talking about… a list of 9 things. Change ANY of them, and the game would have swung to the home dugout:

Inning 3: Duvall’s near miss.

While Max Fried was being interviewed, Adam Duvall drove a ball within roughly 6 inches of the Promised Land in dead center field.

It bounced off the padding in the middle of the yellow boundary line that runs across the very top of the wall. He ended up with a double.

Just as important as the home run he didn’t get, though, was the fact that he was left standing on second base when the inning finished.

Inning 6: one was not enough

The Braves scored in this inning, but they also managed to leave the bases loaded. Just one more hit here could have (effectively) blown the game open… or at least opened it up enough to win.

Inning 7: it still wasn’t enough

With the bases loaded and 1 out, Matt Olson hit a sacrifice fly to push the lead to 2-0. Yet that wasn’t followed-up by any additional support. Two chances for a key hit… only the sacrifice fly plated a run.

Inning 9: The Lux AB

Gavin Lux was down to his team’s last strike with a 2-2 count. The next pitch was a ball. The next pitch was fouled off. One more strike would have ended things right here.

The third pitch was hit for a single, but not just any single…

Inning 9: LUX, part 2

The hit was stung sharply, but Matt Olson had it measured as best he could. His leap was well-timed, but the ball escaped his glove by perhaps only 1-2 inches. Thus virtually anything lower and Atlanta wins.

Inning 9: the Thompson AB

With runners now on first and third, Trayce Thompson was immediately in an 0-2 hole. But Jansen simply could not finish him off.

Thompson saw 3 more pitches after 0-2… a foul and then a called ball when Jansen tried to get him to chase a pitch in the same location (off the plate).

The third pitch (the sixth overall when the Dodgers were down to their last strike) was hit for a surprise single… one that Thompson himself didn’t appear to know the trajectory of.

So once again… one more strike and the game would have been over.

Inning 10: he knows the angles in this park

Freddie Freeman hit a key double to give the Dodgers their 10th inning lead.

How so? He hit the chalk down the right-field line. Two inches to the right and the Braves are still alive for a bottom-of-the-inning win.

Inning 10: catching up to Dirty Craig

William Contreras scalded a 96 mph fastball to center field… 99.7 mph and 396 feet. He needed about 8 more feet.

The 29 degree launch angle was good, though perhaps something slightly lower (Duvall’s shot was 23 degrees, for instance) might have started the walk-off celebration.

In any case, this was another near-miss as the ball was caught up against the wall.

Inning 11: Goldilocks was in the house

This involves Taylor’s key double. If Austin Riley had been too slow in reacting, then that ball almost certainly lands harmlessly in foul territory… a loud strike.

If Riley reacts slightly more quickly, he catches that ball and it’s the 2nd out of the inning with no runs yet across for LA.

But neither happened: it was juuust right… the Goldilocks conundrum.

Riley reacted as well as he did and the ball ticked off his glove — the second near-catch in the last 3 innings — and the fair ball rolled away for an RBI double.

It was that close… all night it was that close. Change any of those events and the Atlanta Braves win the game. This is truly the one that got away on Sunday night.