Braves Hold Off Phils On Opening Day

There was no love for the Braves pitching staff on Opening Day in the City of Brotherly Love.

Mike Foltynewicz grinded out seven strikeouts during six innings of work, while only surrendering one run on six hits.  Luke Jackson followed Folty with 1 1/3 innings of hitless baseball, walking one and striking out one.  A.J. Minter followed Jackson and closed out the 8th inning, getting out Cesar Hernandez to fly out to Ender Inciarte and Rhys Hoskins to ground out to Ozzie Albies.  Only blemish on Minter's appearance was a two out double to Bryce Harper.  After Minter, it was a rough ride for the bullpen.

The Braves extended their lead to 3-1 in the top of the 9th inning after an RBI single by Ronald Acuna, Jr.  Arodys Vizcaino came in to close the game out in the bottom of the 9th inning, he never got out of the inning.  The inning started well for Vizcaino, as he was able to get J.T. Realmuto to look at a called third strike.  He wasn't so lucky with the next batter, Nick Williams.  Vizcaino hung a 1-2 slider and Williams put it into the right field bleachers, to make the score 3-2, with one out.

Odubel Herrera followed the home run with a single to left field.  Manager Gabe Kapler decided to pinch run for Herrera with the veteran outfielder, Andrew McCutchen.  Vizcaino seemed to settle down as he was able to get Maikel Franco to foul out to Freddie Freeman.  However, he was unable to get pinch hitter Andrew Knapp out, as he doubled off the right field wall.

With the tying and winning runs in scoring position, Manager Brian Snitker had seen enough.  He walked out to the mound and signaled for Darren O'Day.  This was O'Day's debut with the Braves, as he was acquired on July 31, 2018 from the Orioles along with Kevin Gausman.  However, O'Day had torn his left hamstring on June 30 and had season ending surgery.

Darren O'Day wasted little time putting out the fire.  He got Jean Segura to pop out to Nick Markakis on the second pitch he had thrown in almost nine months to end the game.

After the game, Brian Snitker said that while he was disappointed Vizcaino wasn't able to come in and close out the game.  He said he isn't worried about Vizcaino's job and that it was just the first game of the season.  Snitker expects Vizcaino to use the off day tomorrow to shake this game off and get back to being the closer he was last year, after missing the entire second half of the 2018 season with shoulder inflammation.