Harris’ hit, Kinley’s save gives Braves win over Yankees

“McMahon, it’s a close friend of mine, a former teammate for the past six years. I know what he’s capable of up there,” Kinley said. “Had a feeling he was looking for something soft again. We were able to get ahead, change speeds, curveballs and a slider, and then put him away with the heater.”

Kinley was in position to make the save because of Harris’ offensive heroics in the half inning before.

With Ha-Seong Kim pinch-running for Matt Olson to begin the 10th inning, Harris got a 2-2 sinker from Yankees reliever Paul Blackburn (3-2) and rolled an RBI single up the middle.

“Just trying to do a job, hit the ball to the right side,” Harris said. “Battled a little bit, (Blackburn) gave me a pitch in, so I kind of kept my hands in to kind of drive it toward the middle.”

All three games in the series between the Braves and Yankees were decided by one run, and the first and last of the three went to 10 innings. The Braves improved to 19-18 in one-run games and 5-6 in extra innings affairs.

Five of the nine runs the Yankees (66-52) scored in the three games came in the eighth inning or later, as was the case Sunday.

In a 1-0 game in the bottom of the seventh, Braves lefty reliever Dylan Dodd walked Jazz Chisholm Jr. with one out before striking out Jones. Didier Fuentes was summoned and struck out Lombard with a 99-mph fastball to end the inning.

Fuentes came back out for the eighth and recorded the first two outs, but then Trent Grisham ambushed a first-pitch, 98-mph fastball and sent it 392 feet out to deep right tying the game at 1-all.

Raisel Iglesias (1-2) pitched the ninth, throwing 10 pitches and striking out two batters in a 1-2-3 frame. That sent the game to extras for the second time in three days, which provided opportunities for Harris and Kinley to make plays.

“Really happy for Tyler Kinley,” Braves manager Walt Weiss said. “(Kinley’s) one of the leaders out there in that bullpen, and that’s a tough situation to come into, with a runner on second, extra innings — trying to keep ‘em scoreless there is really difficult.

“He faced some left-handed hitters, too, and he’s got the weapons for left-handed hitters. The curveball has been really good recently against lefties, and his velocity - he probably had some adrenaline - his velocity was up. Threw the ball really well.”

Sunday’s contest seemed destined for a low-scoring result the way both starters were working out of the gates.

In a pitching matchup of contrasting styles, Grant Holmes battled Cam Schlittler for six innings. Holmes was the first to run into trouble, however, in the sixth when the Yankees threatened.

A single by Austin Wells up the middle and a double to the corner in right by Grisham put two on with one out. But Holmes got Ben Rice to line out to right, then threw a 95-mph fastball past Heliot Ramos to escape the jam.

“I feel like everything I threw, almost, was down in the zone today,” Holmes said. “Called heater that last pitch and I just needed to get it middle-up, just get it in the top part of the zone. And I executed it and got out of the jam.”

Schlittler was downright dominant through six innings having allowed one hit — a Mike Yastrzemski double in the third — while striking out nine. He ran that total to 10 by getting Ronald Acuña Jr. swinging to begin the seventh, then made his first, and really only, mistake of the day.

A 2-0, 100-mph fastball down Broadway was hammered by Olson 393 feet into the seats in right center. Olson’s 34th home run of the season left the bat at just less than 111 mph and was his sixth homer in the past nine games.

Schlittler ended his day by striking out 11, the third time this season he recorded double-digit strikeouts.

Holmes, for the second straight start, went six scoreless innings and allowed just three hits on only 77 pitches. He hasn’t given up more than three runs in 15 straight starts.

“I took back the intensity a little bit. I was getting a little bit ahead of myself earlier in the season, trying to do too much,” Holmes said. “The past few bullpens, I’ve kind of toned down my intensity a little bit, just tried to hit spots, let my stuff play. I got good enough stuff to get people out, just was trying too hard to get them out. So just turned it back a little bit and started throwing more strikes.”

As a staff, Braves starting pitchers have now logged 18 consecutive games without allowing more than three earned runs. And since the All-Star break that group has an ERA of 2.52.