Austin Riley’s week opened with a toothache that woke him around 5 a.m. CT in his Houston hotel. It’s ended with a little more bite at the plate.
The Braves third baseman homered Wednesday and Thursday, then came up empty in Friday night’s 3-0 loss to the Marlins at loanDepot park as he chased a third straight game with a homer. Still, after the way the week began, Riley has reason to feel better about where his swing is headed.
On Sunday, the pain was bad enough that Atlanta lined up a dentist visit. The root canal didn’t happen because of staffing issues, and the discomfort only got worse after Riley got back to Daikin Park and bit into a sandwich.
That kind of start would throw off anybody. Riley has been dealing with a season that hasn’t gone the way he wanted, either.
He’s hitting .222 with a .662 OPS, both career lows, and he’s already piled up a franchise single-season record 197 strikeouts. Two more came Friday against Eury Pérez, who held the Braves to one hit in a shutout.
Even so, Riley’s recent power surge has changed the mood around him a bit. He has four homers in his past 18 games, and he needs one more in the regular season’s final two games to reach 20. That would still sit well below the standards he set from 2021-23, when he went deep in three straight 30-homer seasons, but it would be a clear step up from the first 95 games of this year, when he managed only nine.
“I don’t even look at [the stats] anymore,” Riley said. “At this point, it’s about, ‘What can I do today, and what can I do going forward?’”
That mindset matters now because the Braves are about to reset for October. They open the Wild Card Series on Tuesday at Truist Park, and Riley will go into it with a fresh slate if he can carry this improved stretch forward.
Walt Weiss sees signs that the turnaround is at least moving in the right direction.
“Austin's great,” Braves manager Walt Weiss said. “You never know if he's had an MVP season or if he's struggling.
He’s the same guy. I know, obviously, he's been working really hard all year to try to turn things around, and I think he's trending the right way.”
Riley has been better in the second half, but the strikeouts have remained a concern. He’s been leaning on video and data all season, and that load has pushed him toward trying to simplify things - both in the box and in his head. He’s said some of his swings have felt robotic, and last weekend he noticed something that caught his attention: his right shoulder felt tense and pointed inward in his stance.
Since then, he has been working to keep that shoulder loose, hoping it cuts down on the times he has pushed or flipped the bat through the zone. The goal is simple enough: make the swing look and feel more natural.
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Braves Let A Scoreless Game Slip Away In Frustrating Loss
For most of the afternoon, it looked like the Braves were headed for one of those taut, low-scoring games that can turn on a single mistake. Instead, Miami rookie Eury Perez turned in the kind of performance that can flatten a lineup, pitching his first career complete game while allowing just one hit and one walk and striking out eight in a 3-0 Marlins win.
Atlanta was still within striking distance until Joe Mack broke the scoreless tie with his 14th home run in the seventh. The Marlins then put the game out of reach with two more runs in the eighth, getting help from Jakob Marsee, Heriberto Hernandez and Griffin Conine, leaving the Braves to sit on a frustrating night in which one swing changed everything. [Read more 🡒]
Braves Suddenly Have An October Concern They Cant Ignore
The Braves entered their final regular-season series looking to keep momentum rolling, but Friday night in Miami instead served as a reminder that the offense still has no margin for error. Atlanta was held to one hit in a 3-0 loss, with Sean Murphys sixth-inning single the only blemish on Eury Prezs first career complete game and shutout for the Marlins. Prez was sharp enough to neutralize just about everything, striking out eight and issuing only one walk.
There was at least a positive on the other side of the ball, where Ray Kerr and Grant Holmes combined to give Atlanta a strong pitching effort despite the defeat. Even so, the bigger issue is hard to miss: when the bats disappear like this, the Braves cant afford many more nights where one run feels out of reach, especially with October around the corner and every outing starting to carry extra weight. [Read more 🡒]
Braves Face A Playoff Roster Squeeze Behind The Plate
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Mark Bowman has projected that the Braves could carry a third catcher in Chuckie Robinson for the Wild Card round, giving the club some extra insurance if the lineup usage creates an issue or if an in-game emergency comes up. Atlanta can look at other stopgaps, including Kyle Farmer as an emergency option, but those routes come with limits, which is why the catching group is suddenly one of the cleaner examples of how a postseason roster can get tight in a hurry. [Read more 🡒]