'This was a big win': Riley's 8th career multi-HR game powers Braves past LA

ATLANTA -- Austin Riley made sure the Dodgers exited Atlanta knowing that despite their dominance in this year’s season series, they still have reason to keep an eye on the Braves, who could spend the following weeks and months reasserting themselves as legit World Series contenders.

Riley’s second multi-homer game of the young season backed Bryce Elder’s strong start and allowed the Braves to snap a three-game skid with a 4-3 win over the Dodgers on Sunday night at Truist Park. The victory prevented Los Angeles from sweeping the six-game season series.

“We didn’t win the series, but this was a big win,” Braves manager Brian Snitker said. “It shows us we’re a good team too.”

Riley hit a two-run shot against Dustin May in the first inning and added another against the Dodgers starter in the third. The Braves third baseman’s eighth career multihomer game provided an early cushion for Elder, who allowed two runs and four hits over five innings. Right-handed reliever Daysbel Hernández retired each of the four batters he faced and closer Raisel Iglesias notched three strikeouts, including two with the tying run at third base, in a scoreless ninth.

Needless to say, the Braves exited this series feeling much better than they did when they exited Dodger Stadium on April 2, having just opened the season with a seventh straight loss. They have gone 15-11 since then and they have won 10 of their past 15 games.

“I think this is a really good ballclub here,” Riley said. “We’ve shown it at times and we’ve struggled at times. But this is something to build off of to get that confidence that we can compete with the best.”

Asked before the game about the Dodgers’ great depth, Snitker pointed out the defending World Series champions also get great production from their collection of stars.

Dodgers standouts Shohei Ohtani, Mookie Betts and Freddie Freeman might be the game’s top trio and cleanup hitter Teoscar Hernández ranks among the league leaders with nine homers. But when Ronald Acuña Jr. is activated from the injured list near the end of this month, he will team with Riley, Marcell Ozuna and Matt Olson to give Atlanta its own high-quality quartet.

Acuña was the 2023 National League MVP and Olson hit 54 homers that same year. Ozuna ranks among the game’s top 10 players in OPS since the start of 2023. And Riley was bidding for a fourth straight 30-homer season before his 2024 season ended with a fractured hand suffered in August.

“The quality of hitter [Riley] is, it was just a matter of time,” Elder said. “It’s coming at a big time right now.”

Riley has traditionally been a slow starter. He spent this season’s first month swinging and missing more frequently than he has in the past. The 31.7 percent strikeout rate he carried into Sunday was noticeably higher than the 24-25 percent rates he produced over the past few seasons.

Still, Riley finds himself having hit .292 with eight homers and a .847 OPS through 33 games. He said he was “embarrassed” on April 3, when he ended the 0-7 season-opening road trip having gone 3-for-27 with 11 strikeouts. He has hit .336 with a .949 OPS in the 26 games that have followed.

“Statistically, this has been one of the better starts to my career,” Riley said. “I’m feeling good right now. I’m just trying to build off of that.”

Riley hit a career-high 38 home runs in 2022 and he followed that with 37 homers the following season. Could he finally reach the 40-homer mark this year? Well, he ‘s currently on pace to hit 39 homers and this is around the time he has often started to get hot.

Even though he missed most of May last year with a sore oblique, he still has homered once every 15.5 at-bats in the season’s second month. So, he’s just a few days into what has traditionally been a good month. He also can look forward to July, a month during which he has homered once every 12.7 at-bats.

“When he’s using that gap-to-gap approach like that, that’s a really good sign,” Snitker said. “We know what he can do when he gets hot.”