The louder Citizens Bank Park has booed Ronald Acuña Jr. this weekend, the more comfortable he has looked. Every trip to the plate has felt like an event. One night after launching a 450-foot homer, staring toward the Phillies’ dugout and slowly making his way around the bases, Acuña stepp ed in as the tying run in the eighth inning Sunday. The boos rained down again. As the Phillies gathered for a mound visit, Acuña raised his arms toward the crowd, encouraging the fans to let him hear it. The crack of his bat was almost as loud as the reception. Acuña launched a game-tying three-run homer off a 100.5 mph fastball from Alex McFarlane, erasing a lead the Phillies had spent the entire afternoon building. You could hear a pin drop. After another signature trip around the bases, Acuña re-emerged from the Braves’ dugout and gave himself a curtain call. A road curtain call is almost unheard of. But it felt fitting after the way Acuña has interacted with Phillies fans all weekend. “No, just don’t give up homers in that spot,” McFarlane said when asked about the celebration. “He can do what he wants. I wasn’t really focused on that. I was focused on making my pitch in that moment.” McFarlane attacked Acuña with seven consecutive fastballs. The Braves star fouled off four pitches with two strikes before getting a heater that caught too much of the zone. “That was the plan,” McFarlane said. “I trusted myself to make those pitches. Next time, make it more up in the zone, not in the zone.” The seven-pitch sequence left another decision to dissect afterward. “Now that you have the result, you say yes,” Don Mattingly said of potentially changing Acuña’s eye level. “But if he pops him up, you’re like, ‘You’re good.’ I’m just Monday morning quarterbacking.” Atlanta scored again in the ninth to hand the Phillies a 5-4 loss at a sun-filled Citizens Bank Park. Mattingly had several options available when the eighth inning began. “I figured it was a good spot for Alex,” Mattingly said. “He’s been pitching well. Bowlan was last night, and we’ve kind of been seeing that second day, the stuff ticks down a little bit. Alex was rested. He’s been throwing the ball well.” McFarlane entered having allowed only one earned run over his first 12 major-league appearances. He retired Mike Yastrzemski before Ha-Seong Kim singled and Ozzie Albies walked, bringing Acuña to the plate. Acuña is now 7-for-12 with two homers through the first three games of the series. The last thing the Phillies needed with the postseason approaching was to awaken Atlanta’s biggest star. His eighth-inning swing also helped waste one of Aaron Nola’s most impressive starts of the season. Nola held the Braves to one run on four hits over seven innings, walking one and striking out five. It was his seventh consecutive start of at least five innings with three or fewer runs allowed. He kept his pitch count under control and attacked all afternoon, generating three first-pitch outs and reaching two strikes against 14 hitters. Nola now owns a 3.26 ERA across 12 starts since the beginning of July. The Phillies backed him with two first-inning runs against Tyler Mahle, one of the starting pitchers linked to Philadelphia before Atlanta acquired him at the trade deadline. Kyle Schwarber walked, then advanced to third on an error during a fielder’s choice. Luis Arraez brought him home with a sacrifice fly. As Schwarber returned to the dugout, he appeared to gesture something toward Alec Bohm. Bohm then lined an RBI double that scored Trea Turner. That was all the Phillies produced against Mahle, who entered Sunday with a 1.48 ERA in five starts since joining the Braves. Derek Hill provided a massive insurance run in the seventh, launching a solo homer and continuing to be the clutch hitter Philadelphia needed. Since joining the Phillies in June, Hill has posted a .999 OPS in the seventh inning or later. Schwarber added another solo shot later in the inning. His major league-leading 42nd homer extended the Phillies’ lead to 4-1. Those insurance runs looked as if they had put the game away. They hadn’t. Even after Acuña erased the lead, the Braves weren’t finished. Albies doubled off Jhoan Duran in the ninth, then Austin Riley drove him home with a triple. Duran had not allowed two extra-base hits in an outing since Aug. 27, 2024, also against the Braves, when he was a member of the Twins. For McFarlane, Monday comes quickly. “Come to the field the next day, flush it and believe in yourself,” McFarlane said. “Don’t let that moment define you. Accept failure for what it is and continue to keep pushing.” The loss dropped the Phillies five games behind Atlanta and officially ended their chance of winning the head-to-head season tiebreaker. The Braves now own seven victories with only four games remaining between the clubs. The Phillies appeared to have everything they needed Sunday: seven strong innings from Nola and two late insurance homers. Acuña took it all away. ...read more read less