{"id":566478,"date":"2026-03-28T11:48:19","date_gmt":"2026-03-28T11:48:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/566478\/"},"modified":"2026-03-28T11:48:19","modified_gmt":"2026-03-28T11:48:19","slug":"strong-start-from-chris-sale-carries-atlanta-braves-to-win-over-kansas-city-royals","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/566478\/","title":{"rendered":"Strong start from Chris Sale carries Atlanta Braves to win over Kansas City Royals"},"content":{"rendered":"

ATLANTA (AP) \u2014 The Braves homered three times to back six strong innings by Chris Sale<\/a>, leading Atlanta to a 6-0 victory over the Kansas City Royals<\/a> on opening night Friday.<\/p>\n

Coming off an injury plagued season that ended their streak of seven straight playoff appearances and already plagued by an ailing starting rotation, Sale (1-0) provided just what the Braves needed. He allowed three hits and three walks with six strikeouts before giving way to the bullpen.<\/p>\n

Ozzie Albies<\/a> homered in the first, reigning NL rookie of the year Drake Baldwin<\/a> went deep in the third, and Michael Harris II<\/a> added a two-run shot off Royals starter Cole Ragans<\/a> (0-1) in the fourth. The left-hander was lifted after that inning, having surrendered six hits with four walks.<\/p>\n

Braves newcomer Mauricio Dub\u00f3n finished off the scoring, driving in two runs with a double to the gap in right-center against Bailey Falter<\/a> in the seventh.<\/p>\n

There are plenty of doubts about the Braves rotation after Spencer Schwellenbach<\/a> and Hurston Waldrep<\/a> went down in the spring training before Spencer Strider<\/a> joined them on the injured list late in camp. For one night at least, Sale showed that the top of the starting staff is in good hands.<\/p>\n

The bullpen looks much stronger, with former San Diego closer Robert Su\u00e1rez working a scoreless eighth in his new role as the Braves set-up man for Raisel Iglesias<\/a>. <\/p>\n

Atlanta also made a winner of new manager Walt Weiss, who took over after the departure of Brian Snitker. It was Weiss\u2019 first victory in the top role since 2016, when he finished up a four-year run as Colorado\u2019s manager.<\/p>\n

Up next<\/p>\n

Royals: RHP Michael Wacha<\/a> takes the mound in the second of three games in the series at Truist Park. He is 1-4 with a 4.42 ERA in nine career outings against Atlanta, including seven starts.<\/p>\n

Braves: RHP Reynaldo L\u00f3pez makes his first start in exactly a year. He went five innings against San Diego on March 28, 2025, before being shut down for the rest of the season with shoulder issues. <\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

AP MLB: https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/mlb<\/p>\n

Paul Newberry, The Associated Press<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ATLANTA (AP) \u2014 The Braves homered three times to back six strong innings by Chris Sale, leading Atlanta…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":566479,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[435],"tags":[49,48,462,82],"class_list":["post-566478","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mlb","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-mlb","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/566478","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=566478"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/566478\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/566479"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=566478"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=566478"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=566478"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}