ATLANTA -- For rubbed-armed Brewers reliever Aaron Ashby, it was the worst kind of déjà vu. An opponent down to its final outs. A one-run lead. A pop fly.
Trouble.
Just like on June 8 against the A’s at the launching pad that was Las Vegas Ballpark, Ashby saw a fly ball carry over the fence -- and this time there was no coming back. Ozzie Albies’ second home run of Saturday’s 4-3 Brewers loss to the Braves was a walk-off two-run homer that hugged the right-field foul pole and sent Milwaukee its first three-game losing streak in nearly two months.
Albies became the Braves player with multiple home runs in a game including a walk-off homer since Justin Upton on April 6, 2013, but he didn’t exactly knock the cover off the baseball. Albies’ fly ball left the bat at 94.4 mph with a 36-degree launch angle, according to Statcast, which calculated the expected batting average of a fly ball with those characteristics at .090.
“I was just debating if it was going foul or staying fair,” Albies said. “I started [saying], ‘Please stay fair.’ Thank God it did.”
On this day, at this ballpark, it was enough.
“It’s a home run,” said Ashby, who made no excuses. “A home run’s a home run.”
The same was true on the last road trip in Las Vegas, where Ashby inherited a three-run lead against the A’s, surrendered a two-run homer that was a no-doubter followed by a tying solo home run to Jonah Heim that everyone doubted. Catcher William Contreras clapped his glove, thinking the game was over. Ashby prepared to shake hands. Then the baseball carried over the fence and the game was tied.
The Brewers hung on to win that night in 12 innings.
On Saturday, Ashby’s blown save came with a loss, too.
“I feel for that guy, man,” said Brewers starter Kyle Harrison. “He works so hard, and he’ll be back in there the next game. That’s the kind of guy he is. It’s just an unfortunate situation. The ball was flying today.”
Harrison found that out in the fifth, when Albies hit a solo homer that narrowly cleared the fence in right-center after Harrison had begun the day 12-up, 12-down. The Brewers bounced back to take a 3-1 lead into the seventh inning, when Harrison found trouble and Abner Uribe took over to limit the damage to one run.
The way the Braves were lined up for the eighth and ninth innings, Brewers manager Pat Murphy opted to use closer Trevor Megill against the bottom of Atlanta’s order in the eighth, then turned to the left-hander Ashby to face left-handed-hitting Drake Baldwin and Matt Olson and switch-hitting Albies in the ninth.
“It was very simple,” Murphy said. “It was who they had coming up, the matchups. Very simple. Who else would you want to face Baldwin, Olson and Albies there in our ‘pen? That’s all there is to it. If they would have come up in the seventh, Ashby would have come up in the seventh.”
The Brewers have 74 games in the books and Ashby remains Major League Baseball’s surprise leader with 10 wins, a reflection of his durability (he leads the team with 34 appearances) and performance (3.18 ERA).
But he shouldered the blame for Saturday’s loss after Olson blooped a one-out single and Albies homered in a 1-2 count.
“In that scenario, in a closing scenario, those guys are doing everything they can to put the ball in play and get runs across the plate,” Ashby said. “I need to execute earlier in the count to get ahead of guys so that I can expand my stuff.
“I saw the pitch. We wanted to go away there. We could have gone farther. It’s tough. I wanted to capitalize on those opportunities, and that’s twice now where I feel like I haven’t done that.”
It was a bit of déjà vu for Harrison as well, since he was also the Brewers’ starting pitcher for that wild June 8 game in Las Vegas. Harrison gave up eight A’s runs that day, but he shrugged it off as an outlier because of the ballpark conditions.
His last two starts have backed that up, as Harrison followed scoreless innings against the Phillies last time out with 6 1/3 more quality innings against the Braves.
Here’s the breakdown of Harrison’s season so far:
First 11 starts: 1.57 ERA, 1.03 WHIP, .205 average against
June 8 vs. A’s: 30.86 ERA, 4.29 WHIP, .533 average against
Last two starts: 1.46 ERA, 0.57 WHIP, .163 average against
“Each start, it’s a new day,” Harrison said. “It’s a new challenge. You can’t ride that roller coaster. You just have to attack each day and just try to be the best version of yourself.”
The same is true for Ashby.
“I trust Ash, and I love Ash, and he’s done great for us,” Murphy said. “It’s unfortunate. It’s a bloop hit. A fly ball at 94 [mph] and [36 degree launch angle]. You have to give the kid credit.”