Whit Merrifield thinks MLB will have hit-batter rule in place by 2025; #Braves veteran is on baseball’s Competition Committee that met Wednesday nytimes.com/athletic/57461…

#Braves pitchers had 16 strikeouts in tonight’s 5-2 win against the Rockies, including eight by Morton in five innings and two apiece by four relievers who allowed no hits over the final four innings.

#Braves going for a sweep

Snitker said Merrifield is available off the bench tonight, that he wasn’t going to be used at all last night. Could be back in the lineup tomorrow.

“My phone was blowing up with players saying, ‘Thank God somebody’s finally talking about this. Pitchers, too, which is a bit surprising. A lot of pitchers say, ‘Yeah, this is ridiculous what some of these guys coming up are doing.’" -- #Braves' Merrifield ytimes.com/athletic/57461…

#Braves got a run in the first on three singles, Laureano driving in Soler for a 1-0 lead against Rox

Rockies tied it 1-all when Toglia vaporized an 0-2 López curveball -- 451 feet to straight center, over the trees out there.

The Rockies' Austin Gomber came in with a 4-10 record and 4.69 ERA. He's limited the #Braves to four hits and one run through five innings. Colorado leads 2-1 entering the bottom of the sixth.

Rockies lead 3-1 after getting an unearned run in the seventh against Luke Jackson. Murphy throwing error on a stolen advanced Toglie to third (after Jackson walked him to start inning), and a sac fly brought him in.

Austin Gomber has limited the #Braves to 5 hits, 1 run with 0 walks in 8 innings and only 92 pitches. Yikes. Rockies lead 3-1 after eight.

#Braves lose 3-1 to the Rockies in one of the more uninspiring performance by the Braves in recent memory. They got two hits after the first inning. It was bad. Very bad.

#Braves are now tied with the Mets for third place in both the NL East and the wild-card standings. They are eight games behind the Phillies.

#Braves’ 4-game lead over Mets from a week ago is gone, now they’re tied for third place after moribund offensive performance in series finale against Rockies nytimes.com/athletic/57493…

“It’s the madness of a baseball season….And if you let it spiral, it will take you into a place that's very dark.” New from me: Does a rough second half matter in October? Some World Series hopefuls might want to look away nytimes.com/athletic/57483…

“We always want to stay aggressive; sometimes you’re going to have those innings, and it came back to bite us today.” — Matt Olson after Colorado’s Austin Gomber recorded 21 outs in the last 21 #Braves he faced nytimes.com/athletic/57493…