Before the game started, it was assumed that a pitching matchup between Julio Teheran and Phillies pitcher Cliff Lee would be a duel, and that was definitely the case. Fortunately for the Braves, it was Teheran who came out on top, weaving together a 115-pitch complete game shutout. Meanwhile, Cliff Lee has to be wondering what he has to do to beat the Braves, as he also went the distance with 13 strikeouts to boot in a losing effort for the second consecutive time against the Braves (and the fifth time in his career that he's pitched a complete game that ended in a loss).
The Win Probability chart below basically tells the entire story: Even though the game was 1-0, it never really seemed as if the Braves were in that much danger of losing, and it was mostly due to Julio Teheran's dazzling performance on the mound and also partly due to the fact that the Braves were able to get 11 hits off of Lee during the course of the game.
Four of those hits came from Evan Gattis, who had the biggest hit of them all in 4th inning, which is when he hit an 0-2 fastball that just about cleared the left field fence for his 4th home run of the season. As Joe Simpson noted on TV after the homer, at that point, Gattis had 6 career hits in Citizens Bank Park and 5 of them were Home Runs. Gattis proceeded to have a 4-4 night as he took advantage Lee's tendencies to stay in the strike zone. Clearly, El Oso Blanco is a fan of the stadium in Philly and is very appreciative of its architectural qualities and expresses his feelings by hitting dingers in the ballpark every chance he gets.
There was a tiny bit of drama near the end, which is when Jimmy Rollins reached base with 2 outs to bring up Chase Utley as the potential tying run. However, Teheran assuaged all doubts by getting Utley to ground out to end the game and lock up his first career complete game shutout in excellent fashion.
The Braves picked up their 5th consecutive victory to improve to 10-4. while the Phillies dropped to 6-8. Atlanta will now go for their 2nd consecutive series "sweep" (quotations are there because of last night's rainout) tomorrow with Alex Wood taking the ball, while the Phillies will counter with A.J. Burnett.
Source: FanGraphs