Baseball Cliff Notes: Braves Take Home Title in World Series Game 6
Observations about the final baseball game of 2021 and a deserved title for Atlanta
On Tuesday night, the 2021 MLB season came to a close as the once overlooked Atlanta Braves overachieved their way into post-season prominence in their final 7-0 victory over the Houston Astros from Minute Maid Park in Houston. The Game 6 win would give the Braves a 4-2 victory for the Series and allow them to hoist the Commissioner's Trophy for the first time since 1995.
Game 6 in some ways would be a runaway victory for Atlanta, but the game was not without its moments regardless. In this segment I take a look back at my notes from the game and give perspective with the ability to also provide hindsight.
This is a breakdown of the game that would provide the Braves victory. This is Baseball Cliffnotes.
Pre-Game
Braves 2nd baseman Ozzie Albies has struggled and was moved down to the 7-spot in Atlanta’s order. He was 3 for 22 coming into Game 6. He went 2 for 3 with an additional walk and scored twice in Game 6. Braves manager Brian Snitker masked the move well. With a righty in Luis Garcia on the mound for Houston and the DH in play, Atlanta can use all of their new look outfield in Eddie Rosario, Adam Duvall, Joc Pederson and Jorge Soler. Soler hits second, so Freddie Freeman can hit third, where Albies had been hitting, and this allows Albies to drop.
1st thru 3rd Inning
Kyle Tucker sets a positive tone for Houston immediately with a diving catch on lead-off man for the game, Rosario. The Astros are able to put a better outfield out on the field with the use of the DH. Yordan Alvarez doesn't have to play left-field. Jose Siri can play center while Alvarez doesn't have to play the outfield at all. Siri is a quality outfielder although he doesn’t have a ton of MLB experience yet to his name.
Neither Braves starter Max Fried nor Brantley touched the bag on Brantley’s 1st inning grounder to Freeman that led to Brantley stepping on Fried’s leg. I'm amazed that Fried wasn't hurt worse and agree with John Smoltz's analysis in real time. Freeman initially set his feet to turn to throw to second but thought better of it. He still had time to get the ball to Fried early which would allow Fried to catch and find the base but Fried isn't looking. Good hustle but bad fundamentals. It was a weird play, but results in first and second and no one out without the Astros hitting the ball out of the infield.
Later in the inning its 2nd and 3rd with two out with the AL batting champ in Yuli Gurriel up. Fried’s 0-1 pitch was a fastball low but called a strike. Fried then locked Gurriel up with a fastball down and in at 98. It was the fastest pitch he threw all season. In that moment, Fried only needed 3 pitches for a strikeout. Sure, he got help, but that was fearless.
Garcia strikes out three in a row in the 1st and 2nd innings after the diving catch by Tucker, and they were the 2-3-4 guys in Atlanta’s order. Soler- Freeman-Austin Riley. Dansby Swanson later returns the defensive favor with a good defensive play on Tucker. Swanson made beautiful bare-handed play for the first out. No one's made solid contact on Fried yet.
I mentioned that Fried getting out of the 1st inning turned the game. So did Soler’s at bat against Garcia in the 3rd. Soler is hitting with runners on 1st and 2nd and 2 out. He takes a really a close 1-1 pitch to that correctly gets called a ball as it was a little high. Then Soler checks his swing on a slider down and away that broke out of the zone. The 3-1 pitch would have been a put away had either of the last two worked, it was a perfect slider at the knees that Soler took but was called a strike that brought the count to 3-2. Soler rockets the next slider pulled foul. A fastball at 96 is pulled foul by Soler too.
And then on the 8th pitch of the at bat, Soler hits an absolute bomb of a 3-run home run. He earned that with a great at bat. Fought and fought until he got a pitch in the middle of the plate and he did not miss. The ball was obliterated over the train tracks in left. 3-0 Braves. Exit Garcia.
A lead-off single by the light hitting 9-hitter Martin Maldonado could have been the start of something for the Astros in the bottom half of the inning, but Brantley hit into a 1-6-3 double play and the half inning becomes a minor footnote.
4th thru 6th Innings
Fried gets another double play on Alvarez in the 4th after a lead-off single by Carlos Correa. Alvarez came into the World Series hitting everything (.441 AVG). He has been brutal in this World Series though (.100 AVG). I wonder if having to play in the field messed with his head/routine.
Facing Houston reliever Cristian Javier in the 5th, Swanson gets a 2-0 breaking ball right down the middle that he swings right through. It seems like he may have missed his chance to do damage with a man on base. Javier throws him another better slider on the next pitch one on the outside corner that he misses too.
But a third one gets sent into the left field seats. This one is up and over the plate, hanging. 5-0 Braves. The Braves have 5 runs on just 3 hits. Swanson is 2 for 2 with a walk and 2 homers off of Javier in the series.
Tom Verducci tells the broadcast an anecdote about Braves GM Alex Anthopoulos telling the Braves coaching staff he got them a right-handed bat off the bench in Jorge Soler at the trade deadline. Is this for real? Was Anthopoulos in a coma when Soler led the American League in home runs? Was he THAT worried about Soler's defense? How did he only consider him a hitter off of the bench and not an everyday player?
Soler scores on double by Freeman that just kept carrying til it hit the left-centerfield wall. Houston’s bullpen is really faltering now. Manager Dusty Baker to go to Blake Taylor to face lefties. The problem is that Soler hits between them. He walked and Freeman is the reigning MVP who will hit anyone regardless of handedness if they can't/don't execute. There's a reason Taylor was being used so little. He only faces three batters and can't get out of the inning. Its looking bleak for Houston.
Phil Maton gets a 0-1 gift from the home plate umpire on a ball away to get the count to 0-2 on Austin Riley. Riley ends up hitting one to the track in center that could have been trouble if hit elsewhere. The Astros bullpen is not fooling anyone right now.
Half way home and it appears to be slipping away from the Astros. Down 6-0. They haven't really done anything against Fried. The bullpen is faltering and there is no getting away from it now.
Fried gets two strikeouts in the 5th including one on a fastball that was probably low to Bregman for strike three. It would have been ball four but instead it ended up being part of a 1-2-3 inning. As the inning comes to a close, its noticeable that the umpires check Fried’s hat and glove, only because they also had done so a couple innings previous. They must think he is pitching too well.
1st and 2nd and one out for the Braves and the broadcast is beginning to get a little celebratory of their accomplishments. Joe Buck and Smoltz are talking about Brian Snitker's story a little more, having managed in the Braves organization for about 4 decades. It is amazing that Snitker has done what he has for so long and all in one place. You don't see that in any industry any more, let alone sports. Managers tend to be hired in order to someday get fired. Nothing comes of the threat 6th inning threat as Maton retires the bottom of the order. Still 6-0 going to the bottom of the 6th.
Incredible effort by Swanson diving into the outfield up the middle on a grounder by Brantley. Brantley beat it out but Swanson actually made it close. Had Swanson made the play, Fried would have faced only three batters in all of the 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th and 6th innings, though two of those innings were limited to three batters by double plays.
7th Thru 9th Innings
Rosario almost makes it 7-0 on the first pitch of the 7th inning. He is just out in front as he welcomes Ryne Stanek into the ballgame on his first pitch. Stanek is Houston's 6th pitcher of the game here to start the 7th. Stanek comes back in the count to strike Rosario out on a high fastball.
Soler is so locked in. He laid off of a perfect pitch just below the knees on a 1-2 count from Stanek and then hit a bullet down the left field line that Bregman has to dive and make a great play on to get him out. Even with the out, his discipline has been great all night and he is just hitting rockets.
Freeman goes yard on another ball that just kept carrying to the deepest part of the ball park. He put such a short swing on it and still got it over the yellow line for a round-tripper. This could maybe, possibly be his last at bat as a Brave as he is an upcoming free agent. 7-0 Braves. Looking even more bleak for Houston.
Max Fried is done. He pitched 6 innings and honestly could have probably gone more. Fried was incredibly economical, only throwing 74 pitches with more than 2/3 of them being strikes. He allowed only 4 hits, only 2 of those left the infield and he struck out 6. He had already faced the top third of the order for the third time.
Still, Atlanta has a great bullpen and can go about business using their best guys to get 9 outs; it makes sense to make the change. Though Snitker's trust in the incoming Tyler Matzek immediately leads to Alvarez's first hit in forever, a deep fly ball to right field hit by Gurriel and a liner hit by Tucker that requires a sliding catch by Pederson. He does strike out Bregman on three pitches though and Alvarez never leaves first base.
To his credit, Snitker sticks with Matzek who strikes out pinch hitters Aledmys Diaz and Marwin Gonzalez as Dusty Baker understandably trades defense in his lineup for offense. Matzek then gets Altuve on strikes too striking out the side after what had been a more shaky 7th inning.
If there was a question mark at the back end of the Braves bullpen coming into this post-season, it was actually closer Will Smith, but he had not given up a single earned run in the playoffs coming into this Game 6 and he won’t again on this night. Really impressive.
The broadcast is throwing bouquets at Dusty Baker (and rightfully) and talking about how this could be Carlos Correa's last at bat as an Astro. They are reminiscing about how much improved Houston was in 2021 than in 2020 in the regular season. Despite the lead-off single by Brantley, the writing is a bit on the wall that the season is about to come to a close.
Swanson actually sets his feet to go the short way to 2nd base on the final play but thinks better of it and gets the out at first. Just a little thing that I found interesting that he had trained himself so well that he doesn’t panic or get ahead of himself when about to make the World Series winning putout. Freeman did the same thing back in the first inning on Brantley’s grounder. Great fundamental fielding from start to finish. All those drills Ron Washington goes through with the players are shining through.
Final Thoughts
Atlanta was arguably considered the worst playoff team in this field coming into this playoffs. They only won 88 ballgames in the regular season. I am usually a curmudgeon about teams not deserving to make the playoffs for not winning enough ballgames but this Braves team had a really impressive run in this post-season. They never faced elimination in any playoff series. This was just a really well played month of baseball including having to play against both the Dodgers and Astros. They did more than enough to earn this title.
Jorge Soler would have been my pick for World Series MVP too. He hit .300, slugged .800 and scored 4 times while driving in 6 runs while hitting 3 homers, all of which put the Braves in the lead.
Houston has supposedly played this season clean. For that reason I feel comfortable saying that they deserved to be here at the end too. In some small way, I am ready to put the cheating scandal to rest after this. It still happened, but it doesn't have to be such a specter that follows the team moving forward. Things will probably start heading this direction anyway as more players from that 2017 team depart from the roster. Correa could be a big example of that this winter. Evidence showed that cheating didn't really aid them anyway. The Astros are legitimately talented, but Atlanta was better this series.
I had concerns about Brian Snitker going to the top guys in his bullpen so often in the series, but it really worked out. He didn't have to use Matzek in a Game 5 loss and that loss ultimately didn't hurt the Braves as Fried took care of business in Game 6 and was able to hand it to Matzek for 2 innings coming off of 2 days of rest.
Fried's outing is incredibly impressive. He just emptied the tank. He threw his 3rd fastest pitch of his career this outing. 6 shutout innings against arguably the best offense in baseball in 2021. He showed great poise in the 1st inning after letting runners on 1st and 2nd with no one out and getting literally stepped on by Michael Brantley. Shutting down this potential rally was likely the turning point in this ballgame. He mentioned to Ken Rosenthal after that he didn't want to get dink and dunked into a 4-run deficit like what happened in Game 2. Mission accomplished and then some.
For Game 5, Dusty Baker shifted Carlos Correa, Yuli Gurriel and Alex Bregman around in the batting order as they all had struggled earlier in the series. Their On Base Percentage in Game 5 was .529 as they drove in 4 runs and scored 4 more. In Game 6 Baker stuck with that new lineup and these three Astros’ On Base Percentage was only .091.
The Braves did this without Ronald Acuna Jr. They did this without their best player. Baseball continues to prove itself to be a game that is supremely be about only being as strong as your biggest weakness and not being about star players. Mike Trout and Shohei Ohtani were not going to make the playoffs even when Trout was healthy this season. Those are arguably the two best players in baseball and they are on the same team. Atlanta loses their star and wins a title. Managers don't get to run plays for their best players whenever they want in baseball. They have to hit in order. This game is about depth and needing just enough quality at every position.
Much will be made of the trades Alex Anthopoulos made at the trade deadline. They were gutsy. The Braves went for it at the trade deadline when they weren't even a .500 ball-club. But, just as, if not more important was their homegrown talent. The Braves don't get this title without guys like Freddie Freeman, Ozzie Albies, Austin Riley, Ian Anderson and AJ Minter. That's 1/5 of this championship team right off the top of my head that is homegrown and was imperative to this title.
Did no one on the broadcast mention that Hank Aaron and Phil Niekro had passed this year until the Braves chairman mentioned it in his acceptance speech? We saw the numbers on the Braves caps throughout the playoffs, but I don't recall it ever being mentioned on television in any way. Maybe I just missed it.Hank Aaron is the most famous Brave ever. Phil Niekro was a one of a kind Hall of Fame pitcher. Rest in Peace.
This wasn't a classic World Series or October in very many ways. The Astros didn't win a single game in their playoff run by 3 runs or less. There were a lot of blowouts. I think this is in part because teams are reserving their best bullpen arms more than ever for when they have a lead, so leads tend to grow once they are achieved because the best relievers aren’t being used to keep a game close when a team is trailing. This is only a theory of mine though.
Regardless, this was a full, successful MLB season that spanned from March to November. We didn't have one of these last year, and we may not have another one next year depending on how labor talks go. I'd hate to think either side will give up cash flow and miss games, but you just never know. This season has been a great return to normalcy, that I just hope we are able to keep going.
Twitter- @DJLJR26
Feature Image- Fism TV