Harris drives in three as Braves take opener in Boston

BOSTON — Michael Harris II drove in three runs as part of a four-hit night, Spencer Strider was solid on the mound again, and the Braves took the opener of a three-game series at Fenway Park with a 7-6 win Tuesday over the Red Sox.

Harris capped his night with a two-run home run in the eighth inning that gave the Braves (37-18) some breathing room and halted Red Sox momentum. Strider went five-plus innings before turning it over to Atlanta’s bullpen.

The first four-hit game of the season for Harris came May 8 against the Dodgers in Los Angeles. Tuesday was the ninth four-hit game of his career.

He capped it by whacking a Tyler Guerrero changeup that just above the plate for a 423-feet crowd-silencer. The Red Sox reliever had thrown Harris two 100-mph fastballs earlier in the at-bat.

“I noticed afterwards,” Harris said of the pitch location of his homer, a long ball that turned out to be the game-winner. “Ozzie told me, based off where it was, he thought it was a ball. And I was like, ‘Nah.’ So then I looked at it and it was indeed a ball. I don’t know? Just see ball, hit ball. I didn’t really care if it was a strike or not, just trying to hit it out, and I hit it out.”

Harris’ 12th home run of the season made a winner out of Strider who had left the game with a 5-2 lead in the sixth.

After allowing back-to-back homers to start his outing, Strider (3-0) was crisp and allowed only one more hit the rest of the way. He was lifted after a lead-off walk in the sixth, having thrown 87 pitches (55 for strikes), striking out five and walking three.

“Wasn’t competitive enough, didn’t throw enough strikes, didn’t execute well enough, but guys did a good job of fighting back,” Strider said of his day of work. “I didn’t put the bullpen in a good position, but they got it done, and it’s a win.”

Didier Fuentes came out of the bullpen to relieve Strider with one on and none out in the sixth. Willson Contreras singled to right, and Masataka Yoshida walked to load the bases.

Mickey Gasper hit a rocket up the middle right where Braves shortstop Ha-Seong Kim was waiting to turn a 6-3 double play. That gave the Red Sox their third run, a run charged to Strider.

Dylan Lee got a grounder to short to end the sixth, and a pop-up to center to start the seventh, but then Isiah Kiner-Falefa hit a 1-1 slider out to deep left, cutting the score to 5-4. That was only the fourth earned run Lee had allowed all season.

Harris then gave the Braves their cushion back in the eighth. After Mike Yastrzemski served a pinch-hit single into left to start the inning, Harris crushed the 91-mph changeup down near his ankles for a two-run home run to deep center.

It was Harris’ sixth home run this season coming off a two-strike pitch.

Robert Suarez pitched a 1-2-3 eighth for the Braves. Closer Raisel Iglesias, who had pitched 28 2/3 straight innings without allowing a run, gave up a two-run single to Kiner-Falefa in the ninth but nothing else.

Iglesias got a force out at third with runners on first and second and one out and then a comebacker that ended the Red Sox rally.

“This place, it’s a tough place to win, man. It’s like a lot of places on the road, right? But this place is different,” Braves manager Walt Weiss said. “Anything in the air to left field it’s usually runs. It’s almost like a Coors Field type of feel where nothing’s safe, nothing feels safe. But nice job of coming in here and getting that one.”

The Braves improved to 17-5 this season when facing a left-handed starting pitcher, 30-0 when leading after the eighth inning, 20-8 in road games and 14-4 after having lost the previous game. They also avoided what would have been just their second three-game losing streak of the season.

Earlier, however, it did not look like that’s how the night would progress.

Strider’s second pitch of the evening left the ballpark. It was a fastball down and in and that Jarren Duran yanked deep out to right.

Strider’s fifth pitch of the evening also left the ballpark. It was a slider over the heart of the plate that Ceddanne Rafaela put on top of the Green Monster.

Fifteen of the next 17 Red Sox batters were retired. Still not good enough for Strider, he seemed to indicate.

“I feel better about getting outs than I did about giving up runs,” he said. “I think I made two pitches in bad spots and major league hitters do what major league hitters do to bad pitches. Just wasn’t competitive enough in the strike zone consistently and need to execute better and got to find a way to be better.”

Red Sox starter Ranger Suarez had befuddled Braves hitters until walking Mauricio Dubón on five pitches with two outs in the fifth. Before facing Matt Olson, Suarez and his first baseman Contreras and catcher Gasper had a lengthy meeting on the mound.

Whatever the trio decided the plan was did not work.

Olson ambushed the first offering, an inside sinker, and sent it deep and high into the twilight for a game-tying two-run home run that went 428 feet out to right.

That was the seventh career home run at Fenway Park for Olson in his 19th game there. Olson had one hit in his previous 18 at-bats before the homer.

“You’re going to go through some ups and downs throughout the course of a year, and being able to contribute, and feeling like I helped the team win today, it builds some confidence for sure,” Olson said.