PHILADELPHIA - Grant Holmes walked into Citizens Bank Park on Monday already feeling the squeeze.
The Atlanta Braves right-hander had to work through that pressure immediately, too. In the first inning of a 1-0 loss to the Philadelphia Phillies, shaky command put him in a jam with two outs and the bases loaded. For a moment, it looked like the kind of inning that can snowball in a place like this.
Instead, Holmes settled himself with a reminder from pitching coach Jeremy Hefner, the sort of guidance that usually comes in bullpen work when nobody is watching.
“I just encouraged him to throw a 90 percent pitch every single time and be smooth,” Hefner said. “And if it doesn’t come out at 95 mph, it’s OK. If you pitch at 92 mph and you’re better off third time through (the batting order) or deeper in the game, then you can navigate the game a little bit better as opposed to trying to go 110 percent every pitch.”
Holmes took that advice and answered with a 94.8-mph fastball that got Bryson Stott to line out and strand the runners. From there, he settled in and retired 10 straight hitters, with half of those outs coming by strikeout. The third inning was especially sharp, as Kyle Schwarber, Trea Turner and Bryce Harper all went down on strikeouts in order.
That outing helped Holmes finish with six scoreless innings, three hits allowed and six strikeouts in his 27th start of the season. He also generated 17 whiffs, and his fastball sat at 94.8 mph, a touch above his season average of 94.1.
The Braves couldn’t back him up. They managed only two hits against Jesús Luzardo’s shutout, missing a chance to leave Philadelphia with a series win and settling for a split instead. Even so, the result still left Atlanta four games ahead of the Phillies with 18 games remaining.
Holmes has been piling up these kinds of starts. He has gone six innings in four of his past six outings that were not affected by rain, and he has a 2.22 ERA in 24 1/3 career innings against the Phillies. Since the start of August, he owns a 2.27 ERA and has kept opponents off the board in five of his seven starts.
“I say it all the time, Grant’s been a really good starter for us,” Braves manager Walt Weiss said. “And today’s stuff was as good as I’ve seen in a while.”
Holmes, with his long curly orange hair and handlebar mustache, is hard to miss. He looks more like someone hauling fish from the Chattahoochee River than a pitcher dealing with September pressure in the majors. But the calendar is turning, and the stakes will keep rising from here.
When asked whether he views each start as a chance to prove he can handle postseason work, Holmes pushed that thought aside.
“The main objective is to go as deep in the game as I can and give the team a good chance to win. I felt like I did a pretty good job at that today.”
Still, the case for Holmes is getting louder. Behind Chris Sale and Tyler Mahle, he belongs in the conversation for Atlanta’s playoff rotation. His next start will likely come against the Phillies again, between Sale, whom Weiss said will pitch in the series opener Friday at Truist Park, and Mahle.
Holmes sounded ready for whatever comes next.
“(Philadelphia) isn’t an easy place to play,” Holmes said. “Being that the fans are loud and are into it every inning.
But I feel like we’re pretty good at Truist Park. So I feel like we have the upper hand on this.”
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