Freddie Freeman played his first postseason game at Truist Park since Game 5 of the 2021 World Series on Tuesday night. He won that title with Atlanta. He spent 12 years in the organization. The crowd booed him in every at-bat.
He hit a solo home run in the fourth inning, part of the two-swing sequence that decided a 3-1 Dodgers win, and got an ovation on his way off the field.
Freeman was unbothered. “I’ve got a gray uniform on, I expect boos,” he said. “I would be surprised if they cheered me in October. So it’s OK. It’s all love.”
He has heard it before
“When you get on the field, you really don’t really hear anything because it’s so loud,” Freeman said. He added a line that puts the whole thing in perspective: “I’ve been coming here for five years now. So I don’t think anybody’s really looking at who played for what teams in the past.”
That is probably true of the players. It is clearly not true of the 42,420 people in the building.
What he said about facing Chris Sale is better
Freeman has now homered in Games 2 and 3 of this series, both off Atlanta pitching. Talking to Justin Verlander on the FOX postgame about hitting Sale, he did not sugarcoat the at-bat.
“I always say, against him, you got to be prepared to die,” Freeman said. “It’s an extremely hard at-bat for a lefty.”
There is evidence for that beyond the vibe. Freeman posted a .680 OPS against left-handed pitching in 2026. Sale struck out six of the first nine Dodgers he faced. The home run came on a mistake, and Freeman knew it.
Mauricio Dubon almost erased him
In the third, with the game scoreless, Freeman hit a ball 101.3 mph toward the left-field wall. Dubon leapt and took it away. Dubon said he was “just trying to help Chris Sale out a little bit.” Sale called it an “amazing catch.”
One inning later Freeman went over the fence instead, right after Enrique Hernandez’s two-run shot. Those two swings were the entire Dodgers offense.
Verlander’s night was its own story
Freeman also pre-empted Verlander’s first postgame question, telling the newly retired pitcher, “Congratulations on a Hall of Fame career. I miss you and congrats.” Verlander made his final appearance in the Tigers’ Game 161 and has joined FOX’s postseason panel alongside Alex Rodriguez, Derek Jeter and David Ortiz.
Manny Machado did something similar after the Padres’ win the same night, opening with “Hey man, didn’t you just retire?” and then, “You gotta enjoy it a little bit, cmon now!”
Atlanta needs its own hitters to do this
Freeman is a problem for the Braves because he is a good hitter on the other team. The larger problem is in their own dugout. Ronald Acuna Jr. is 3-for-21 this postseason. Matt Olson is 4-for-23 with nine strikeouts. Drake Baldwin is 3-for-23 with six strikeouts. Atlanta went 0-for-6 with runners in scoring position in Game 3.
The Braves trail 2-1 and need to win twice. Tyler Mahle starts Game 4. Walt Weiss keeps insisting his hitters are about to break out. He is running out of innings to be right.
A longtime sports reporter, Carlos Garcia has written about some of the biggest and most notable athletic events of the last 5 years. He has been credentialed to cover MLS, NBA and MLB games all over the United States. His work has been published on Fox Sports, Bleacher Report, AOL and the Washington Post.