By Justin Gray
On Tuesday, June 3, the Atlanta Braves welcomed the Arizona Diamondbacks into town for a three-game set.
Both teams were ice cold coming into the series with Atlanta losing eight of 11 and Arizona losing nine of eleven, so someone had to get hot.
Unfortunately, it was not the Braves as they lost game one, 8-3, in a game that felt winnable until they allowed a three-run home run in the ninth to Corbin Carroll.
Atlanta had a prime opportunity to get back on the saddle in Wednesday’s affair with their ace Chris Sale on the mound.
Sale was near perfect, as he went six innings, allowing one run on three hits and striking out 10 batters.
As we’ve seen time and time again, it wasn’t good enough because the offense couldn’t give him support.
In fact, they didn’t even get a hit until Sale’s outing was over, coming on a single by Ronald Acuña Jr. to break up the no-hit bid in the bottom of the sixth inning.
It got worse, down by one run in the bottom of the eighth inning, Alex Verdugo and Sean Murphy led off the inning with singles. Clemson baseball alumnus Eli White pinch ran for Murphy and stole second, giving the Braves runners on second and third with no outs.
After that, Drake Baldwin and Michael Harris II struck out, Acuña was intentionally walked, then Austin Riley struck out to end the inning with no runs.
In the ninth inning, Raisel Iglesias allowed a run and the Braves trailed 2-0 going into their final frame.
Atlanta loaded the bases thanks to two walks and a hit batsman, Drake Baldwin then drew another walk to bring home a run and cut the deficit in half. It wouldn’t batter as four pitches later Harris II struck out again to lose the game, 2-1.
The boo birds came out and rained down in Atlanta from the fans and it felt like for the first time in almost a decade, the Braves had hit rock bottom as they found themselves six games under .500 and over 10 games out of first place.
Wildly enough, though it felt like rock bottom, somehow Atlanta topped that yesterday.
In game three, the Braves offense erupted for 10 runs and were in control of the game, leading 10-4 in the ninth inning with one out and Scott Blewett on the mound.
Five hits and six runs later, the Diamondbacks took an 11-10 lead on a double by Eugenio Suarez.
After giving up that lead, you’re never going to get anything going in the bottom of the ninth.
The boos rained down once again from dissatisfied fans after watching one of the worst losses in Braves history.
Per Braves Radio play-by-play analyst Ben Ingram, Atlanta had won their last 766 games when leading by 6+ runs after eight innings. The last loss like such happened in 1973 when the Mets scored seven in the ninth to beat the Braves 8-7.
This felt like the real rock bottom, with the loss making Atlanta 3-11 in their last 14 games.
It leaves fans wondering if it is too late to make a run and is it possible for this team to make a run.
The good thing about the current playoff format is that three wild card teams get in and we’ve seen teams that are bad in the first half of the season go on runs and make the playoffs, some of them making deep runs.
I’m not saying that is or isn’t what will happen with this Braves team, but vibes are as low as we’ve seen since 2016 and the offense is as bad as it's been since then as well.
Typically, Atlanta has a few runs in them as the season progresses, but only time will tell for the 2025 version of the franchise.
Tonight, they will head to San Francisco for a three-game set with the Giants, one of the better teams in the National League and will have Spencer Schwellenbach on the mound to try and stop the bleeding.
