Four-run 10th gives Braves win over Orioles

“I feel like I just stayed ready and I’m just thankful to God and the Braves for this opportunity and glad it worked out,” Hernández said via Braves team interpreter Franco Garcia. “Again, thankful for the Braves to give me this opportunity to be here, and really, I just want to do my part to help win them a championship.”

Hernández’s efforts allowed the Braves to hang around and win just their third extra-innings game of the season. It was also their 31st come-from-behind victory and 33rd when hitting at least two long balls.

But they didn’t even take their first lead until nine innings had been completed.

In the top of the 10th in a 3-3 game, with Brewer Hicklen beginning the inning as a pinch-runner at second base, Joey Bart blooped a single to right, putting runners at the corners.

Jim Jarvis, who had come on late as a defensive replacement at shortstop, chopped the first ball he saw from reliever Andrew Kittridge to second. Jackson Holliday made a diving stop, but when he threw to second to try to get a force out, the ball sailed into left field, allowing Hicklen to score.

Kittridge (1-2) nearly got out of the inning after that, but Matt Olson unloaded on a 1-2 fastball and belted it 416 feet into the stands in left-center for a two-out, three-run homer. That sent Orioles fans to the exits faster than the ball had left the stadium.

“Was able to get a pitch up,” Olson said. “Kittridge’s been around for a while, good stuff, good pitcher. Obviously, made some good pitches to ‘Bally’ and Ozzie (Albies) before me, and like I said, was able to just get one up and put a good swing (on it).”

Dylan Lee allowed a run on a sac fly, then a two-run homer off the bat of Christian Encarnacion-Strand in the bottom of the 10th before closing out the win.

The Braves had been trailing 3-2 with one out in the eighth when Baldwin strode to the dish to face Orioles right-handed reliever Rico Garcia. In a 1-2 hole, Baldwin went down — literally to one knee — and whacked a changeup into the seats in right to tie the score at 3-all.

It was Baldwin’s 20th homer of the season, surpassing his 2025 total.

Hernández began his Braves debut in the seventh. He pitched a 1-2-3 inning that frame, stranded a runner at third in the eighth and then got Orioles designated hitter Taylor Ward to hit an inning-ending ground ball to third to leave the bases loaded in the ninth.

“Just stayed attacking and stayed aggressive,” Hernández said. “I looked at it as, ‘This is mine,’ and I couldn’t give it away.”

Braves manager Walt Weiss said Hernández was one of only four available bullpen arms for the team Friday. The 31-year-old would have kept pitching as long as the game had remained tied.

When asked how many innings he could have gone Friday, Hernández laughed and said, “No sé.”

The Braves (61-42) improved to 3-5 in extra-innings games, 22-12 in series openers and 15-14 in one-run games.

Much earlier in the evening, Braves starting pitcher Grant Holmes ran into a bit of misfortune in the second inning when a 3-1 pitch to Leody Taveras was called a strike, then overturned by ABS for a ball — it had missed the strike zone by less than a 1/10th of an inch. The two-out free pass allowed Holliday to come to the plate and he ripped a single to right.

That put runners at the corners for Encarnacion-Strand, and the Orioles third baseman banged a two-run double into the left field corner to give the home team an early 2-0 lead.

Orioles starter Trevor Rogers was sharp out of the gates, retiring the first eight hitters he faced and working a scoreless first three innings. But the Braves began to make noise a second time through the order.

Albies’ single to right was followed by Michael Harris II’s double to the corner in left. Mauricio Dubón got the Braves on the board with a sacrifice fly to center, and Austin Riley tied the game with a two-out single to the right of shortstop.

The Orioles (50-54) took the lead right back in the bottom half of the inning on a single, walk, sacrifice bunt and Holliday sacrifice fly to right, making it 3-2.

Holmes completed five innings, allowed three earned runs on six hits, walked two and fanned five. The righty threw 91 pitches, 57 for strikes. He escaped the fifth when shortstop Jorge Mateo collected a ball in the hole between short and third and threw a one-hopper to first that Olson scooped for the out.

“Obviously, I would have liked to gone deeper in the game,” Holmes said. “But having my pitch count being high in the second inning, I tried to get some early outs those next couple innings and just tried to make it through five. Wish I could have gone out there for sixth, but it is what it is. We won at the end of the day.”

Lefty Danny Young and righty Tyler Kinley both worked the sixth, and the latter came in with two outs and two on to face former Braves’ catcher Chadwick Tromp. Tromp lifted a fast-diving line drive to shallow right, but Dubón came charging toward the infield and laid out to make the catch.

Rogers allowed only the two fourth-inning runs while working around six hits through seven innings. He walked none and struck out six, but wasn’t awarded the win because of Baldwin’s homer in the eighth, a homer that eventually sent the game to extras.

“We played well, and you got to play well to beat teams in this league,” Weiss said. “There’s some good things happening right now. It’s well documented the tough June we had, but after the break, we’ve really turned it around, and we’re playing well in pretty much all phases.”