The Braves hit four home runs but couldn’t overcome the Devil’s magic in a 9-5 loss to the Cardinals

So much happened in the Braves’ 9-5 loss to the Cardinals on Saturday that it felt like the game wasn’t nine innings in two and a half hours, but rather an entire geochronological era. In the end, the Braves were unable to overcome the Cardinals’ .500 BABIP despite hitting four home runs of their own. And a bunch of hits from their opponents, settling for a split of the doubleheader.

The game quickly got out of hand. Masyn Winn led off with a triple and scored on a sacrifice fly, the Braves tied it with a leadoff triple by Jarred Kelenic, which came on a terrible run and a diving catch by Lars Nootbaar in right field, and a single by Ozzie Albies through Second baseman Nolan Gorman appeared to be on the verge of getting even more points against Cardinals starting pitcher Sonny Gray when Austin Riley nearly hit a home run down the right-field line, but upon review, the hit was ruled a foul and Riley was subsequently tagged out.

The tie didn’t last long, as Gorman hit a one-out, one-on-one home run on a Bryce Elder slider to right-center field. The hit had no chance of being ruled a foul, and the Braves were down 3-1 instead of 3-1. But then things got worse, with a walk, a steal, a slow roller single, a single on a sight roller, and then a more traditional, hard-hit grounder, making it 5-1 before Elder could escape.

From that point on, it looked like the Cardinals were going to have the upper hand for a while. Over the next eight at-bats, the Braves got just one hit off Gray, and that single was immediately erased on a double-play ball. Meanwhile, Elder showed some peripheral comfort with the blowout game, striking out five straight batters at one point. Things looked slightly brighter when Marcell Ozuna homered off Gray deep in the fourth, but after his fourth and fifth straight outs, Elder gave up a home run to Brendan Donovan to keep the game tied at four.

Elder ended up having a really weird outing, with a 10.80 ERA, a 5.37 FIP due to the two home runs, but a 1.65 xFIP due to the 9/1 K/BB ratio. It probably looked worse than it was due to the timing of the runs allowed and the fact that his slicing of the Cardinals hitters happened in what was effectively a timeout, but it’s something to build on… ish.

Regardless, the game changed dramatically in the bottom of the sixth inning, when Sonny Gray was forced to face the Braves a third time with his big lead. That ended up nearly wiping out the lead, as Riley, Ozuna and even Eddie Rosario all had masterful, no-doubt shots against Gray to make it 6-5…

..and then things started to get a little ridiculous. Up until this point, the Cardinals had scored three runs on two home runs, but the difference in the game was their devil magic. After Aaron Bummer pitched a scoreless sixth inning (before the Braves’ home run barrage to Gray) and allowed a single to lead off the seventh, Grant Holmes came on for his three-inning must-win inning in a game the Braves had decided to use to essentially rest the rest of their pitching staff, got a fly ball, and then survived thanks to two barrel outs by the Cardinals.

Although the Braves appeared to have Gray on the metaphorical ropes in the sixth inning, he had an easy seventh inning with just nine pitches. Instead, the Braves came close to tying the game in the eighth inning against Kyle Leahy, when Riley got another hit, this time a double off the wall. That meant Matt Olson and Ozuna had a chance to tie the game or more, but neither did, and the Braves at least had a chance to lead the game by one run going into the final inning…

…until things went wrong for Holmes in the top of the ninth inning.

First, Orlando Arcia couldn’t convert a weak hit into an out. Then, a throw over an attempted steal put the runner on third base, and a one-out infield single made it 7-5. But, it didn’t really matter, as a bloop single, another Cardinals grounder, and an eyeball single made it 9-5. The Braves were quietly beaten in the ninth inning by Leahy, with the potential for a thrilling bottom of the ninth thwarted.

On the plus side, four home runs are fun and the offense continues to improve, albeit in fits and starts. On the minus side, getting murdered by a .500 BABIP isn’t so fun, but given that the Braves had three barrel outs in this game without hitting any themselves, you can’t really say they lost this game outright because of the devil’s magic. I imagine the final xwOBA counts will put both teams in pretty similar territory, which doesn’t make a four-run difference feel good, but that’s the way it is.

The Braves will try to win the series behind Spencer Schwellenbach tomorrow afternoon; the rookie has been hit pretty hard by BABIP here and there, but maybe the Cardinals are out of mana and can’t cast their evil magic anymore. We’ll see.