The Register Citizen (Torrington, CT)
Acuna homers, shines defensively, Braves beat Mets
ATLANTA — Ronald Acuna Jr. homered and threw out a runner at the plate to back
Max Fried’s fifth straight win, leading the Atlanta
Braves past the New York
Mets 53 on a sweltering Tuesday night.
With Atlanta under a heat alert and the temperature at 94 degrees for the first pitch, the Braves cooled down a New York team that had won 15 of its last 17 games to surge into playoff contention.
Acuna sparked a tworun first against Zack Wheeler by leading off with a long single off the wall in rightcenter, coming around to score his 100th run of the season. In the fourth, the 21yearold lined a 409foot drive into the leftfield seats for his 34th homer.
But the youngster wasn’t done. Acuna ended the sixth by scooping up a single to left by Juan Lagares and rifling a onehop throw to the plate to get Todd Frazier trying to score from second, sparking chants of “MVP! MVP! MVP!” from the crowd at SunTrust Park.
The Mets have lost two in a row for the first time since July 1819 at San Francisco.
Fried (144) went six strong innings, surrendering his lone run in the second after plunking Wheeler with a twoout, twostrike pitch. Jeff McNeil followed with a runscoring single.
That was it for the Mets against Fried, who threw exactly 100 pitches, surrendering six hits and three walks.
Every Atlanta starter except shortstop Charlie Culberson had at least one hit. Freddie Freeman, Josh Donaldson, Matt Joyce and Ender Inciarte also had RBIs for the Braves.
Wheeler (97), who grew up in suburban Atlanta, was pounded for 12 hits and all five Atlanta runs before he was lifted after the fifth.
The Braves’ shaky bullpen, coming off a grim weekend in Miami, protected the lead for Fried even though Shane Greene was charged with two more runs while retiring just one hitter in the eighth. The former Detroit closer has a 14.55 ERA since coming to Atlanta in a tradedeadline deal.
Luke Jackson worked a perfect seventh and Mark Melancon, another tradedeadline acquisition, went 123 in the ninth for his first save with the Braves and second of the season.
Atlanta maintained a sixgame lead over Washington in the NL East, while the Mets dropped nine games back.
TRAINER’S ROOM
Atlanta rookie slugger Austin Riley will not need surgery on his injured right knee and expects to return to the Braves’ lineup in about two weeks. The outfielder went on the 10day injured list Aug. 5 after spraining his knee during a workout.
UP NEXT
Steven Matz (77, 4.49) will take the mound for New York in the second game of the series, facing Atlanta’s Dallas Keuchel (35, 4.83) in a matchup of lefthanders. Matz is coming off a strong outing against the Marlins, surrendering two runs over 6 2⁄3 innings in a 72 victory. Keuchel was roughed up by Miami in his last start, giving up eight runs, 10 hits and three homers in 32⁄3 innings.