Brandon Beachy dominated the potent Blue Jays lineup, Dan Uggla, Brian McCann and Brooks Conrad all homered, the bullpen was great once again and the Braves won their fourth game in a row. Not too bad for a hot Wednesday afternoon.
Beachy made his first start since returning from the disabled list with a strained oblique and fooled the Toronto hitters for six innings. He struck out eleven batters and allowed just one run on four hits and a walk. Beachy's fastball sat in the low-90's for the entire game and used his curveball to record seven of the eleven strikeouts. He broke out his changeup against the tough, left-handed batters and allowed just one extra-base hit, a Jose Bautista home run.
Former-Brave Jo-Jo Reyes made the start for Toronto and was actually pretty good outside of two or three pitches. He worked 5.1 innings and allowed four runs on five hits and two walks. He struck out just two batters.
Dan Uggla homered in the second inning to get the Braves on the scoreboard. It was a no-doubt shot and was the first homer of the season off a left-handed pitcher for Uggla. Brian McCann followed in the next inning with a 2-run blast of his own, which was his seventh homer in fourteen games.
Jose Bautista finally broke out of his slump with a solo-home run in the third to cut the Braves lead, but Toronto wouldn't push anymore runs across the board despite having runners on base all game.
Brooks Conrad delivered an insurance run in the seventh with a home run that bounced off the right field wall, hit the front wall of the outfield seats and then bounced back onto the field. Conrad was tagged out at third once Jose Bautista threw the ball back to the infield, but a quick review had the call changed to a homer. Conrad trotted home and Atlanta took a 5-1 lead.
Scott Linebrink, Jonny Venters and Craig Kimbrel all worked relatively quick innings to finish out the game. Atlanta's pitching staff allowed just two runs for the entire series.
With the sweep in hand, the club will have more than 48 hours off before resuming play. They'll actually leave for San Diego this evening and spend the off-day in SoCal, which should be a nice mini-vacation for the team.
It'll be Derek Lowe against Tim Stauffer on Friday night at Petco Park. First pitch is at 10:05EDT.