Max Fried pitched his second complete game of the season and while it wasn’t a shutout, the offense made sure that his performance was more than enough for a win as the Atlanta Braves eventually cruised to a 9-2 win over the Chicago Cubs.

This game started out pretty quietly as both teams traded scoreless innings for the first couple of frames. Neither team had a hit until the third inning, which is when Michael Harris II broke up the monotony with a single. If that wasn’t enough for you then Adam Duvall made things even louder as he took a fastball from Justin Steele that was high and just barely in the zone and promptly deposited it into the bushes in the batter’s eye to make it 2-0 Braves at that point.

The scoring stopped for both teams for a while after that, as the Braves continued to sputter at the plate. Meanwhile, Max Fried was in “Maximum” mode tonight as he was quite literally unhittable for the first five innings of this one. Sadly for Fried and the Braves, things changed in the bottom of the sixth inning. That was when Ian Happ broke up the no-hitter with a leadoff double. Happ made it to third base after a one-out wild pitch from Fried and then he eventually made it home thanks to a productive out from Miguel Amaya. The scoring stopped there for Chicago but at 2-1 Braves, it was clear that Atlanta needed to put some room between themselves and the Cubs if they wanted to make sure that Fried’s performance didn’t go in vain.

Boy, oh boy, did the Braves ever put some room between themselves and the Cubs or what? It all started with Orlando Arcia hitting a double off the wall to lead of Atlanta’s half of the seventh inning and then he advanced to third base thanks to a ground ball from Michael Harris II. Adam Duvall got hit by a pitch immediately after the productive out, so that meant that Zack Short had an opportunity to do some damage with just one out. Zack Short is quite easily the least-imposing hitter in this lineup, so he fell back on a tactic that ended up working out perfectly for him: The squeeze bunt.

Short’s short boy base hit made it 3-1 Braves and with the way things had been going recently, it would’ve been understandable to believe that this was all the scoring that the Braves would be capable of on this particular night. Instead, it was only the beginning. Jose Cuas entered the game in relief of Justin Steele after the bunt and Ronald Acuña Jr. greeted him to the game with a bunt to load the bases. Ozzie Albies then made sure that Adam Duvall got home as he hit an opposite-field sacrifice fly to make it 4-1 Braves. Again, it would’ve been totally understandable to think that this would’ve been the extent of the scoring for the Braves in this inning and probably for the rest of the night.

Fortunately for us, Marcell Ozuna and Matt Olson both had other ideas. Cuas made a nightmarish mistake and left an 82-mph sweeper right in the middle of the zone for Ozuna to feast upon. Once the ball eventually landed in the seats, it was now 7-1 Braves and Atlanta had some much-needed (on multiple levels) breathing room. Matt Olson got in on the fun four pitches later as Cuas tossed a sinker that didn’t sink and Olson proceeded to send it flying into the seats in right field to make it an 8-1 game. Once the smoke cleared, the Braves had themselves a six-run inning and it was one of those frames that this team badly needed to have as a reminder of what they’re truly capable of.

The Braves weren’t done there, either! After Max Fried pitched a shutdown seventh inning, Atlanta added on in the top of the eighth inning as the Braves eventually cashed in a one-out double from Michael Harris II. You could give the Cubs an assist on this run, as an error from Nick Madrigal allowed Harris to get to third base and then a wild pitch from Cuas basically gave him the red carpet trip home in order to make it 9-1 at that point. The Cubs got that run back in the bottom of the eighth after a couple of singles and a wild pitch on a strikeout allowed old friend Dansby Swanson to score from third base.

Other than that, the only drama left heading into the ninth inning was whether or not Max Fried would stay in and go for the Complete Game. Sure enough, Fried went back out there for the ninth after throwing 94 pitches over eight innings. Fried ended the game with 105 pitches over nine innings, as he sat down the final three batters in order to end the game, give the Braves a dominant win and give himself his second Complete Game of the season so far.

To say that this game was a palate cleanser would be an understatement. The offense broke out in a big way and the pitching continued to give opposing batters a bunch of fits. This was just about all you could ask for out of a Braves win at any point in the season but it was especially nice to see after all the scuffling that we’ve witnessed recently. Atlanta could do with plenty more “palate cleansers” in the near-future and hopefully they’ll take the series in tomorrow’s rubber game starting at 2:20 P.M. E.T.