ANAHEIM, Calif. — Grant Holmes recovered nicely after some stormy weather in the early goings, and the Braves’ offense did the rest in a series-winning 8-2 victory over the Angels on Wednesday at Angels Stadium.
The win capped the Braves’ 13-game stretch in as many days to start the season. They emerged from that challenge 8-5 and return home to enjoy an off day before hosting the Guardians for a three-game series starting Friday. The Braves went 3-0-1 in the first four series of the season.
Holmes (1-1) was fantastic after allowing two runs over two innings, especially considering he had walked in a run and had the bases loaded with no one out in the second. But he worked his way out of the jam and would go to retire the next 17 of 18 hitters he faced until a two-out double in the seventh.
In 6 2/3 innings, Holmes struck out six and held the Angels to five hits, departing with two outs in the seventh after 99 pitches. The Braves’ MLB-best bullpen handled its business from there.
“I feel like I was a little overthrowing, just missing, nibbling a little bit, and just not filling up the strike zone,” Holmes said. “And after that, it was just, ‘Here’s my stuff, hit it if you can.’”
Offensively, the Braves needed only eight hits to plate their eight runs, taking full advantage of six Angels walks and an error. The team now has a +34 run differential and is 5-0 when facing a left-hander starting pitcher.
The Braves gave Holmes an early lead. Ronald Acuña Jr., who came into the game with just three hits in his previous 17 at-bats, blooped a broken-bat double into shallow left, went to third on a Drake Baldwin grounder to second and scored on Ozzie Albies’ sacrifice fly to center.
In the second, Austin Riley led off the inning with a walk, stole second with two outs and scored on Jonah Heim’s ground-rule double to the right field corner.
Angels right fielder Jorge Soler, involved in Tuesday’s on-field fight with Braves starter Reynaldo López and appealing a seven-game suspension handed out by MLB on Wednesday, led off the bottom of the second with a solo home run into the Braves’ bullpen. That had Holmes teetering on the edge of unraveling as he gave up a walk, single and two more walks to let the Angels tie the game.
But Holmes got a strikeout, pop to shallow right and Mike Trout groundout to second with the bases still loaded. The Angles would rue that opportunity to bust the game open.
“It did get a little dicey in the second inning. Walked that guy in, then gotta find a way out of it,” Holmes said. “Just fill up the strike zone, let your stuff work and hopefully you can get three outs without giving up another run. After that it was more of just getting outs, getting back to my pitch count. Just filling up strikes zone and not trying to strike everybody out just so I could get deeper in the game.”
Matt Olson’s two-run shot to right made it 4-2 in the top of the third and a throwing error later in the inning from Angels shortstop Zach Neto allowed Riley, who had doubled to right after Olson’s homer, to score from second.
All five runs (four earned) were charged to Angels starting pitcher Reid Detmers (0-1) who was lifted with one out and a man on in the fifth.
“Riley stealing second today and a ground-rule double. Finding a bunch of different ways to score, I’ve said it for a while, that’s what good teams do,” Olson said. “You can’t just rely on one thing, whether it’s small ball or launching homers or whatever. You got to find a way to kind of mix it up and go with the flow of the game.
“You’re gonna go through little ruts - or not ruts, but periods of time where you’re doing one thing great and not doing the other. Just got to be able to manufacture those runs.”
Ryan Zeferjahn came in and couldn’t put out the fire. A walk to Riley preceded a two-run double from Mauricio Dubón into the left field corner making It 7-2. An inning later, Baldwin added to his league-leading RBI total (15) with a run-scoring single to center.
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