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You can’t win them all, and when you are understrength because of a COVID outbreak among your team, that makes things even harder. Such was the situation for the Milwaukee Brewers against the Atlanta Braves on Saturday night, as the Brewers are now up to five players either with positive cases or as close contacts. But the game goes on, and this one didn’t work out very well for the Menomonee Valley Nine.
Brandon Woodruff started for the Brewers and was staked to an early lead. In the second inning, Avisail Garcia led off with a single. A one-out single by Lorenzo Cain put runners on first and second, then Luis Urias was hit by a pitch to load the bases. That brought up Manny Pina, and he hit an RBI groundout to give Milwaukee a 1-0 advantage.
The lead wouldn’t last, however. In the fourth, Austin Riley walked against Woodruff to lead off. The back-to-back one-out singles by Jorge Soler and Dansby Swanson led to a run scoring, knotting things up at 1. It would stay that way until the 6th inning. Adam Duvall singled to get things started, then with one out, Dansby Swanson launched a two-run homer to center field to make it 3-1. That would end Woodruff’s day through 5.1 innings, as he gave up eight hits, one walk, and struck out six.
Daniel Norris was called upon for his first outing and navigated through the rest of the sixth inning, then John Curtiss made his team debut in the seventh. Curtiss’ time did not go as well. He punched out the first batter he faced in Joc Pederson, but then allowed consecutive singles to Ozzie Albies and Freddie Freeman. Austin Riley walked to load the bases. After a flyout by Duvall, Soler singled to shortstop and brought in a run to make it 4-1. Then Swanson came up to the plate and hit his second home run of the game, this time a grand slam that broke the game wide open, making it 8-1.
That’s where things would end after Miguel Sanchez was called upon to finish up the final few outs. The Brewers managed to rack up seven hits and four walks in this game, but went 0-for-10 with runners in scoring position and stranded 11 men on base during the course of the contest. These teams will be back at it on Sunday for the series finale, which is set to feature Brett Anderson versus Charlie Morton. First pitch is scheduled for 12:20 PM central time.