BALTIMORE -- The Braves' bullpen is doing so well that even when they take the loss, you still come away impressed.
That was certainly the feeling after Saturday night’s 3-2 defeat to the Orioles that evened Atlanta’s first road series of the second half, and amounted to only its third loss in nine since the All-Star break.
The 21-year-old right-hander Didier Fuentes (4-1) was the hard-luck loser when he allowed Dylan Beavers’ two-out walk-off single in his second inning of work at Oriole Park at Camden Yards.
But on a different night, left fielder Mauricio Dubón might have completed the difficult diving catch to rob Jackson Holliday -- the eventual winning run -- of a one-out double to help Fuentes escape unscathed.
As it was, there was still plenty to admire about the rookie’s clean eighth, his three strikeouts and his 11 pitches that touched 100 mph, even if Beavers got hold of the last to dump it into right field.
“I think that’s probably the biggest velocity from him, at least this year, for sure,” said Braves manager Walt Weiss. “He was throwing the ball really well. They got a couple big hits late.”
Before that, right-hander Victor Mederos struck out three and allowed one hit in two clean frames. He backed up righty starter Bryce Elder, who struck out eight and allowed two runs (one earned) over five innings.
It was just another day in the life of a relief group where everyone seems to contribute to what is an NL-best 3.26 bullpen ERA, despite the NL’s seventh-largest workload at 392 innings.
And Fuentes, who is still carrying a 2.70 ERA in 35 games during his first full MLB season, seems likely to become an increasingly important part of it.
"I feel like I’ve won or earned that confidence a little bit through the body of work that I’ve put in up to this point,” Fuentes said through an interpreter. “And I’m just going to keep working and keep trying to get better.”
At the plate, the Braves only had six hits and went 0-for-6 with runners in scoring position, plating a run in the sixth inning on Dubón’s RBI groundout and one in the eighth on Ozzie Albies’ 17th home run.
But if there was blame for Saturday’s loss, it should probably land on a defense that failed to live up to its own sparkling standard from the night before.
Dubón’s failure to snag Holliday’s liner was understandable but still perhaps unexpected after the sensational grab he made a night before to save at least a run in Friday’s 7-6, 10-inning win.
Meanwhile, rookie Jim Jarvis had the roughest night of his defensive MLB career, with two almost identical drops of pop flies off the bat of Orioles slugger Pete Alonso.
The first was more costly, leading to the Orioles’ first run on Taylor Ward’s two-out single in the third. And Jarvis narrowly missed on a chance to rectify his own error when he narrowly mistimed his attempt to grab Ward’s liner, merely deflecting the ball before it landed in shallow left field as Alonso scored from second.
“It’s a tough night, right?” Weiss said. "You play in this league long enough, you’re going to have tough nights. It was just one of those nights. Some weird things happened on some balls.
“He heard [center fielder] Michael Harris coming on the first one. The line drive, I think he just lost in the crowd, very easy to do.”
Elder allowed two runs over five innings of work and, like Fuentes, carried some of his better stuff of the season.
But he finished the night frustrated with the four walks he allowed that unquestionably shortened his outing, to go with just four hits and eight strikeouts. He was lifted not long after leaving a slider up that Gunnar Henderson yanked over the out-of-town scoreboard for a 2-0 Baltimore lead.
“Even on some of the outs I got, I was down 1-0, 2-0,” Elder said. “I thought my stuff was really good. I’ll take that as a positive. But a couple of the walks, after double plays, it’s just kind of exhausting. You feel like you’re rolling and then all of a sudden you’re back down in a hole.”