Nicky Lopez got a chance to join the Atlanta starting lineup on Monday thanks to an injury and responded with three hits and three RBIs to help the Braves rout the visiting New York Yankees 11-3 in the opener of their three-game interleague series.
Lopez got the start for All-Star second baseman Ozzie Albies, who missed his first game of the season because of a sore left hamstring.
Lopez, picked up from Kansas City at the trade deadline, went 3-for-4 and has eight RBIs in four games with Atlanta. It’s the most RBIs by a player in his first four games with the Braves since the run batted in became an official statistic in 1920, according to MLB.com. He had plate appearances in only two of the four games.
The Braves totaled 15 hits and scored six-plus runs for the 60th time this season, the best in the majors. Eddie Rosario also picked up three hits, including his 17th homer, a two-run shot in the eighth, and a double. He drove in four runs.
Matt Olson, Marcell Ozuna and Austin Riley each added two hits, with Riley clubbing his 29th home run.
Atlanta starter Max Fried (4-1) pitched six-plus innings, exiting after allowing a leadoff single in the seventh inning. Fried allowed two runs on eight hits, one walk and two strikeouts. He picked off one runner.
Reliever Pierce Johnson worked two scoreless innings, but Joe Jimenez surrendered a run in the ninth on Anthony Volpe’s RBI triple.
The Braves battered New York starter Clarke Schmidt, an Atlanta-area product who was facing his favorite childhood team for the first time. Schmidt’s streak of 14 consecutive starts without allowing more than three runs came to an end, as did his six-game winning streak. It was Schmidt’s first loss since June 6.
Schmidt (8-7) pitched 2 1/3 innings — his shortest start of the season — and allowed a season-high eight runs on nine hits, two walks and three strikeouts.
Isiah Kiner-Falefa went 3-for-4 with an RBI for the Yankees, and Volpe had a double as well as his triple.
—Field Level Media
