There wasn't a lot to like about last night's loss to Atlanta. I know they're a good team, but the Braves were struggling tremendously before hitting Minute Maid Park. In point of fact, here are some of the ways in which last night stung:
- The Braves scored as many runs last night as they did in their previous five games combined.
- To find an entire series where Atlanta scored more than 11 runs, you have to go back to the May 13th three-gamer against Philadelphia.
- Atlanta hadn't scored 11 runs in a game since April 3 against Washington and only scored in double digits twice this season before Friday night.
- The Braves are averaging 3.9 runs per game this season. Only four teams in the National League are worse than that (Dodgers, Giants, Padres, Nationals).
- Atlanta has scored 11 total runs or fewer against four other opponents this season. That's the total number of runs in head-to-head matchups with four other teams, don't quite equal the number of runs Atlanta scored in one game against Houston.
I know it was bad. It was ugly, even with the two runs in the ninth. This team just has it in them to be horrendous some games, and it came out in this one. Mark Melancon and Sergio Escalona were the only relievers to get through this one unscathed, which is sad.
As the headline on Astros.com so eloquently points out, all this carnage hid a very nice game from Michael Bourn, who went 4 for 5 with two doubles and a triple, raising his line to .286/.351/.393 for the season and made him 15 for 42 in his last 10 games. If only the rest of the offense were that hot.