ATLANTA – Charlie Morton combined with three relievers on five hits and the Atlanta Braves defeated Nathan Eovaldi and the Texas Rangers 5-2 on Saturday night for their sixth consecutive win.
Travis d’Arnaud, who drove in six runs with three homers, including a grand slam, in the Braves’ 8-3 win on Friday night, hit a two-run homer off right-hander Austin Pruitt in the eighth.
Led by strong starts from Morton and Chris Sale, the NL East-leading Braves won the first two games of their weekend series against the Rangers, who lead the AL West.
“They kind of set the tone for this homeland,” d’Arnaud said of the starting pitchers. “Two guys who want the ball for the last game of the World Series against the previous World Series champions. I think they were ready to go and that was evident today and yesterday.”
Morton (2-0) allowed two runs and four hits with two walks in six innings. Joe Jiménez, AJ Minter and Raisel Iglesias each pitched a scoreless inning. Iglesias made his sixth save in as many chances with a perfect ninth.
Luis Guillorme had a scoring double and Matt Olson’s sacrifice bunt broke a 2-2 tie in Atlanta’s three-run second.
Eovaldi (1-2) allowed three runs and five hits and six walks in 5 1/3 innings. He lamented his inability to protect a 2-0 lead in the clash against Morton.
“We had the lead and you can’t give a guy like that another opportunity,” Eovaldi said of Morton.
Rangers manager Bruce Bochy said before the game that he planned a surprise in the bullpen. It was right-hander Jon Gray, who started four games this season and replaced Eovaldi in the sixth.
Gray, who worked in relief in just one of 209 regular-season starts with Colorado and Texas, recorded two outs to strand two runners in the sixth before adding two more outs in a perfect seventh.
Ronald Acuña Jr. led off the first with an infield single. Following a bunt single by Michael Harris II, a double steal gave Acuña 189 career steals, tying him with Rafael Furcal for the Atlanta record.
The Braves moved to Atlanta in 1966. Including the team’s years in Boston and Milwaukee, Acuña ranks 11th in franchise history. Herman Long had a franchise record 434 steals for the Boston Braves from 1890-1902.
Harris had three hits.
Rangers first baseman Nathaniel Lowe was held hitless in his return from the injured list. Lowe missed the first 20 games of the season because of a strained right oblique.
Travis Jankowski hit Austin Riley’s drive off the top of the center field wall in the eighth.
TRAINER’S ROOM
Rangers: RHP Max Scherzer (back surgery) had no difficulty the day after Friday’s two-inning simulated game. Bochy said Scherzer will have one more bullpen session before possibly beginning minor league rehab on Wednesday. …C Sam Huff was recalled from Triple-A Round Rock. 1B Jared Walsh was assigned to the mission and C Jonah Heim was placed on the bereavement list.
NEXT
Braves rookie RHP Darius Vines (0-0, 1.93) will make his second start of the season and fourth of his career in the final game of the series on Sunday night. Rangers RHP Michael Lorenzen (1-0, 0.00) is 1-1 with a 7.52 ERA in 12 games, including two starts, against Atlanta.
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