The Braves nearly let an early lead go to waste for the second straight night. However, Matt Kemp didn’t allow that to happen. The left fielder hit a go-ahead, two-run double in the eighth inning, the key blow in a 7-4 comeback win over the D-backs on Tuesday night at Chase Field.
After Atlanta loading the bases with two outs against Arizona reliever Jake Barrett, Kemp sent a double to right field to plate a pair of runs, with a third scoring on an error by Mitch Haniger to turn the Braves’ one-run deficit into a two-run lead. Jose Ramirez earned the win, helping the Atlanta bullpen combine for 6 1/3 scoreless innings.
“That’s a good ballgame to win, especially because they had a big inning against us again,” Braves manager Brian Snitker said after his team won for just the third time in its past 13 games. “We’ve been victimized by that over the last week. The guys keep coming back.”
Yasmany Tomas and Jake Lamb each drove in a pair of runs for the D-backs, who lost for the first time in five games against the Braves. Atlanta scored two runs in the first but came back to rally against Barrett, who allowed all three runs in the eighth on three hits and a walk.
“The whole bullpen has been used pretty hard, so he’s been run out there a bunch,” Arizona manager Chip Hale said. “It was all location for Jake tonight. If you look at the pitches, I went down and looked at them after the inning, he was supposed to go in here, the ball ends up out. Out, in. Just very, very poor location.”
D-backs starter Archie Bradley gave up three earned runs over five innings. Braves starter Rob Whalen lasted just 2 2/3 innings, giving up four earned runs on two hits with four walks and a pair of strikeouts.
Each of the D-backs’ first two hits plated a pair of runs. After Jean Segura, Michael Bourn, and Paul Goldschmidt drew consecutive walks with two outs in the third, Tomas slapped a two-run single to left. After Welington Castillo was hit by a pitch to reload the bases, Lamb snapped a 2-for-48 skid with a two-run, ground-rule double to right to put Arizona ahead, 4-2.
Tyler Flowers highlighted a two-run first with a RBI double and Adonis Garcia notched his third hit when he began the fourth with a double and scored on Kemp’s sacrifice fly. But the Braves stranded eight runners through the first three innings and 10 through the first seven innings before Kemp’s two-run double.
“The last week or two, I haven’t really been hitting that well with runners in scoring position,” said Kemp, who entered the eighth with four hits in his past 22 at-bats with runners in scoring position. “So it felt good to get it going for our team to put us up.”
It appeared it was going to be a short night for Bradley after he needed 55 pitches to get through the first two innings and faced 19 batters in the first three frames. But after allowing a double to Garcia to open the fifth, Bradley retired the last six batters he faced to get through five innings.
“It wasn’t great, wasn’t terrible, it was kind of in between,” Bradley said. “I struggled with command early on, kind of the whole game, just bouncing back and forth.”
Whalen retired eight of the first nine batters he faced and then none of the final six. The rookie right-hander, who has exceeded his previous career high by 48 innings, issued three consecutive two-out walks in the third inning before surrendering his first hit — Tomas’ two-run double. He surrendered another two-run double to Lamb and then watched Ryan Weber retire all seven batters he faced. The Braves’ bullpen allowed three hits over 6 1/3 scoreless innings.
“When Rob left, it was kind of like, how are we going to piece this thing together now?” Snitker said. “All the relievers did great. That was big for Weber to come in in that situation and get us to those other guys.”
Dansby Swanson recorded his third multi-hit performance and notched his first career RBI — a ninth-inning sacrifice fly. The heralded shortstop was selected by the D-backs with the first overall pick in the 2015 Draft and was traded to the Braves in December.
Julio Teheran (3-9, 2.90 ERA) will take the mound when Atlanta resumes the four-game series Wednesday at 8:40 p.m. CT. Teheran’s velocity was down a notch when he returned from the disabled list Friday and allowed the Nationals three runs over five innings. Thunder Radio will bring you that broadcast beginning with the pregame show at 7:30.
