“It was his hip,” Braves manager Brian Snitker explained. “As the inning wore on, it affected him. The longer he was out there, the worse he got.” Dylan Lee came in to pitch at the start of the third inning, but Atlanta’s comeback attempt fell short, resulting in a 5-4 loss that eliminated the Braves as the Padres completed a two-game sweep.
Musgrove, making his postseason debut, encountered issues while pitching in the fourth inning. After falling behind 2-1 on Matt Olson with two outs, he was visited on the mound by pitching coach Ruben Niebla, Padres manager Mike Shildt, and an athletic trainer before leaving the game. “It’s frustrating. I want to be out there and finish the job,” Musgrove said. “This is the last thing I want in my first postseason outing, but that’s just the reality of it.”
Musgrove’s status for the remainder of the postseason, including the upcoming best-of-five Division Series against the rival Dodgers, remains uncertain. “If you’re not a pitcher, it’s very difficult to explain. I just had a hard time getting to full extension and letting pitches go,” he explained. “I had two outs in the inning, hoping to get through it and address it afterward, but I didn’t make it to that point.”
Musgrove has previously dealt with injuries, having missed a total of 63 games this season due to right elbow inflammation. “It would be irresponsible to get too deep into this,” Shildt commented on Musgrove’s situation. “Something just didn’t feel right in his elbow. Structurally, they feel it is OK, but we’ll get more evaluations as we go.”
Notably, Joe Musgrove threw the first no-hitter in Padres history on April 9, 2021, shortly after being acquired in a trade with Pittsburgh. Fried was a first-round draft pick of the Padres in 2012 before being traded to Atlanta in 2014, where he has since made significant contributions, including starting and winning the clinching Game 6 of the 2021 World Series against Houston.
