The Atlanta Braves aren’t scared and they continue to truly live up to their name.
Less than two weeks ago, the World Series champions were overmatched and outclassed against the team they’ve been chasing in the NL East this year in the Mets.
They haven’t a series since and ensured on Tuesday night it will continue to be that way securing at least a split of the four game weekday tilt in Atlanta.
Charlie Morton was dominant on the mound, Matt Olson and Robbie Grossman went deep, and the Braves made it eight straight wins with a 5-0 blanking of the division-leading Mets.
The Braves have won the first two games of a four-game set by a combined margin of 18-1, closing the gap on New York to 3 1/2 games.
Morton (6-5, 4.04ERA) surrendered three hits and a walk in 6 2/3 innings, registering his fourth double-figure strikeout game of the season with 12 Ks. Meanwhile, a Mets starter was lifted after two innings for the second straight night due to injury.
This time, it was 10-game winner Taijuan Walker making the early exit because of back spasms.
This comes one night after Carlos Carrasco pulled his oblique and will now miss nearly a month because of it .
R.J. Alvarez, who New York called up from Triple-A Syracuse before the game, took over for Walker and surrendered a 413-foot homer to the Atlanta trade-deadline acquisition in Grossman, the second batter he faced.
Alvarez served up a majestic 4443FT two run HR to Olson in the fourth, a two-run shot for his 25th of the season.
Olson added a run-scoring single in the seventh to finish with three RBIs on the night.
Alvarez worked 2 1/3 innings, giving up four hits, three runs and three walks.
Dylan Lee took over for Morton in the seventh and struck out Jeff McNeil with two runners aboard to end New York’s biggest threat, before AJ Minter and Raisel Iglesias worked scoreless frames in the eighth and ninth to polish off the shutout.
I used AP to help me with the structure of this article
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