Braves bring the pain in 11-3 win over Yankees

Thanks to yet another huge night at the plate from Atlanta's lineup and a bounce-back performance from Max Fried, the Atlanta Braves were able to run out as comfortable winners in an 11-3 stomping of the New York Yankees.

While the Braves may have eventually raced ahead in this one, it was the Yankees who initially came out of the gates swinging. New York actually had the bases loaded with one out against Max Fried in the first inning, as two singles and a walk got them to that point. Fortunately for us, Fried was able to mitigate the damage to just one run, as a productive ground out and a not-so-productive out ended the threat right there for the Yankees.

As it turned out, they needed a lot more than just one run because the Braves were not messing around at the plate tonight. Clarke Schmidt got the first two outs with little-to-no issue but then he ran into Austin Riley and Riley ran into a sinker that he sent opposite field into the Chop House to tie the game up at one run apiece.

The Yankees put in some work with two outs in the very next frame, which eventually culminated with Isiah Kiner-Falefa hitting a liner down the first base line to plate Oswaldo Cabrera and put the Yankees back in front. They could've kept the inning going with a man on base but IKF tried to extend it into a double and got thrown out at second base to end the inning right there. Once again, the Yankees were left thinking that they should've had a chance to come away with a bit more than they did.

They definitely needed to since the Braves would pick up where they left off in the first inning. Marcell Ozuna and Eddie Rosario reached base via walk and a double, respectively, which eventually brought Nicky Lopez to the plate with those two in scoring position. Lopez has been on fire to start his tenure as a member of the Braves and he continued to swing the hot bat as he poked one out to left field to bring in both Ozuna and Rosario to put Atlanta back in front. Lopez then went on to steal a base and that ended up being important since Michael Harris II was able to plate Lopez with a single to make it 4-2 Braves after two innings.

Clarke Schmidt's extended run of starts where he gave up only three runs or less in each of them came to a loud end with this game and the Braves weren't done with him after the second inning, either. As Max Fried pitched his first scoreless inning of the game in the third, the Braves returned to the plate looking to deliver a knockout shot.

There were two men in scoring position on with one out when Eddie Rosario came up and he made no mistake at the plate — he looped one out into shallow left-center field to bring home both Travis d'Arnaud and Marcell Ozuna to push Atlanta's lead to four runs. That was the first in a string of three-straight RBI singles, as both Orlando Arcia and Nicky Lopez extended Clarke Schmidt's misery on the night. Lopez was the last batter that Schmidt would see on the night, as the Braves hung eight runs on the local product from Acworth in a bit of a rough homecoming.

While this was going on, Max Fried settled quite nicely into the game and didn't give up any more runs from that point forward. Once Fried was done for the night, he had pitched six innings and only given up those two runs with one walk, eight hits and a pair of strikeouts thrown in there with a pickoff to boot. While it would've been nicer to see Fried miss a few more bats than he did tonight, the Braves are not being choosy when it comes to results from their starting rotation at this particular point in the season. He got the job done and that's all that's being asked of Atlanta's rotation at the moment.

Atlanta added onto their lead in the sixth inning thanks to a wild pitch from Albert Abreu with the bases loaded and then Eddie Rosario eventually put the cherry on top of another dominant performance from this Braves lineup. He came up with a man on base in the eighth inning and took advantage of a hanging changeup and sent it flying and careening off of the seats in the Chop House to make it an 11-2 game for the Braves after eight innings.

Joe Jiménez got the ball for the ninth inning and while the Yankees did add on another run, there was no further drama involved in finishing off the eight-run win for the Braves. This game went about as well as the stats would've indicated — the Braves were able to take their habit of making hard contact and use it to punish Clarke Schmidt's habit of giving up hard contact and it eventually led to a huge explosion of offense for the Braves. Meanwhile, Max Fried continued to help get Atlanta's rotation back on the right path and this was the right recipe for yet another win for the Braves. They'll be going for the series win tomorrow night at 7:20 P.M. E.T. as Bryce Elder will be starting for Atlanta against Luis Severino and the Yankees.