The Atlanta Braves lost a right fielder with a Most Valuable Player trophy on his mantle and a starting pitcher with a 20-win season on his resume within a three-day span this week.

But Eli White and Martin Perez proved the sturdiness of the Braves’ B squad on Saturday afternoon.

The Braves will look to earn a series win on Sunday afternoon when they visit the New York Mets in the finale of a three-game set.

Bryce Elder (5-3, 2.66 ERA) is slated to start for Atlanta against fellow right-hander Freddy Peralta (4-5, 4.04) of New York on Sunday.

White homered and had two RBIs while Perez earned the win by tossing 5 1/3 solid innings Saturday in the Braves’ 3-1 victory.

The win snapped a three-game losing streak for the Braves, whose mini-skid was further marred by Ronald Acuna Jr. and Spencer Strider heading to the injured list. Acuna, who won the National League MVP award in 2023, sustained a strained left hamstring trying to leg out an infield single against the Chicago White Sox on Tuesday night. Strider, a 20-game winner in 2023, exited Friday’s start with right elbow soreness.

But White, manning right field Saturday, finished with three hits — one fewer than he had in his previous 20 at-bats dating back to May 9.

The 35-year old Perez lowered his ERA to 2.90 after allowing two runs or fewer for the seventh time in 10 starts. He has become a rotation mainstay with Spencer Schwellenbach and Hurston Waldrep sidelined since spring training.

“The guys who don’t play every day, they’ve been big for us,” Braves manager Walt Weiss said. “When they get a chance to play, they help us win games.”

Injuries have decimated the Mets, who are in last place in the NL East at 31-39. Opening Day starters Francisco Lindor (left calf), Jorge Polanco (left Achilles) and Luis Robert Jr. (back) are on the injured list while Juan Soto (right calf) and Francisco Alvarez (right knee) also spent time on the shelf.

Soto and Bo Bichette had two hits apiece Saturday, but the rest of the Mets lineup went 2-for-23. Soto was stranded at second in the ninth inning after Alvarez hit into a game-ending double play.

“We have been having a lot of tough times with the injuries,” Soto said.

One of the Braves’ first surprise contributors was Elder, who had a 5.59 ERA the previous two seasons but was pressed into the Opening Day rotation when Schwellenbach and Waldrep suffered elbow injuries in February.

Elder continued his strong season in his most recent start last Sunday, when he didn’t factor into the decision after allowing two runs over six innings in the Braves’ 3-2 win over the Pittsburgh Pirates.

Elder is 3-0 with a 3.94 ERA in six career games (five starts) against the Mets.

Peralta took the loss Tuesday night after giving up six runs over six innings in the Mets’ 7-0 setback to the St. Louis Cardinals.

He is 5-2 with a 4.26 ERA in nine games (eight starts) against the Braves.

–Field Level Media

The young Chicago White Sox aren’t about to lose any confidence over their 7-1 loss to the visiting Los Angeles Dodgers on Saturday.

Dodgers right-hander Yoshinobu Yamamoto retired the first 23 batters he faced before a Mookie Betts error gave the White Sox a baserunner with two outs in the eighth. The chance at a perfect game was gone, and Yamamoto lost the no-hit bid in the ninth when Chicago’s Tristan Peters led off with a home run.

After the game, the White Sox figuratively tipped their caps to Yamamoto — the MVP of the 2025 World Series – and were ready to move on to the finale of the three-game series on Sunday. The teams split the first two, with Chicago posting an 8-2 win on Friday before the Yamamoto masterpiece.

‘‘He’s Yamamoto,” said Chicago third baseman Miguel Vargas, who played with him briefly in Los Angeles before a 2024 trade to the White Sox. ‘‘I guess he’s that effective most of the time. We put a lot of good swings out there today, and we [stayed together] as a group. It was his day. and good for him.”

Peters was equally nonchalant.

‘‘It just shows the ups and downs of baseball that a team can go through and an offense can go through,” Peters said. ‘‘I wouldn’t even say we had a bad offensive day, either. I think we put together some good at-bats, and we hit the ball hard. That’s just baseball.”

A third consecutive sellout crowd is expected Sunday at Rate Field, where fans have flocked to see not only the Dodgers but the resurgent White Sox, who are in playoff position approaching the halfway point of the season. That comes after three consecutive 100-loss campaigns.

Their loss on Saturday snapped an eight-game home winning streak. Since April 27, the White Sox are 19-4 at home.

Left-hander Bryan Hudson (3-2, 2,25 ERA) will be making his 34th appearance of the season and fourth as an opener. Hudson threw one scoreless inning in the Friday win, retiring the Dodgers on seven pitches. In five career relief appearances against Los Angeles, he is 1-1 with a 6.75 ERA in 5 1/3 innings.

He is expected to give way to Erick Fedde (1-5, 4.69), who was the bulk-inning pitcher on Tuesday in a 6-5, 10-inning win over the Atlanta Braves. He did not figure into the decision after giving up two runs (one earned) on six hits and no walks in five innings. He struck out four.

Against the Dodgers, Fedde is 1-1 with a 1.96 ERA in four games (three starts).

To start a new streak, the White Sox will look to get their bats going again against Los Angeles right-hander Emmet Sheehan (3-3, 4.70 ERA). In his most recent start, last Sunday against the Los Angeles Angels, he pitched only 1 1/3 innings in a 13-5 loss.

He gave up two runs on three hits and two walks, but he was pulled after getting only four outs on 49 pitches.

“Just frustrating, definitely. Couldn’t put guys away,” Sheehan said after that outing. “Not efficient. Not good all around.”

He has never faced the White Sox.

The Dodgers’ in-game decisions will be made Sunday by bench coach Danny Lehmann, who will manage the team. Manager Dave Roberts left Chicago immediately after the game for Northern California, where his daughter, Emme, will graduate from Stanford. He will rejoin the club on Monday.

“I think that’s one of the good things about the way the world has evolved to where you do some things for mental health or your family and it’s not frowned upon that you care less about your job,” Roberts said before the Saturday game.

“It’s good to feel like I can go and I don’t feel like I’m being judged because I’m going to celebrate my daughter. … I encourage my staff to do it. You see it all around baseball. People are doing things for their family and paternity leave, things like that. It’s healthy.”

–Field Level Media

The Houston Astros have already secured their first winning series at Kansas City since 2022. Considering how well they’ve fared with Spencer Arrighetti on the mound, a sweep could be next.

They’ll try to accomplish that feat Sunday and win a sixth consecutive start made by the talented right-hander in this series finale against the scuffling Royals.

After using a nine-run first inning to win 10-8 in the series opener Friday, Houston rallied from deficits of 3-0 early and 7-5 late Saturday, to pull out an 8-7 victory over the Royals.

“We’re ready for any moment,” Astros outfielder Brice Matthews, who has homered in each game of this set, told Space City Home Network.

“We’re just there to fight, to claw. Try to get a win each and every day.”

The Astros are 9-1 this season in games started by Arrighetti (7-1, 2.21 ERA).

He yielded seven earned runs through his first eight 2026 starts, but has equaled that amount in the two since. Three of those runs came during the Astros’ 5-4, 10-inning victory over the Los Angeles Angels on Monday, when he also gave up four hits and walked four, but completed six innings for his fifth quality start of the season.

Arrighetti surrendered seven runs and seven hits over just three innings of Houston’s 11-2 loss at Kansas City in 2024 — his only previous start against the Royals.

This weekend, Houston has totaled 21 hits, and clubbed eight home runs in Kansas City. Christian Walker has hit two of his 18 homers in the series, while MVP contender Yordan Alvarez has three hits in each contest, including that two-homer first inning Friday, to raise his batting average to .327.

Riding a 20-game on-base streak, Alvarez is batting .359 in 34 career games against the Royals.

Alvarez has never faced scheduled Kansas City starter Stephen Kolek (3-1, 3.14 ERA), who’s been a pleasant surprise since being pressed into service in early May due to injuries within the starting rotation.

He’s been especially good at home, going 2-0 with a 1.80 ERA in three starts.

Kolek yielded three earned runs over 12 innings of his two June starts. On Tuesday, the right-hander yielded eight hits, but only an earned run over five innings of the Royals’ 5-3 home victory over Texas.

A Houston native, Kolek has never faced the Astros, but will try to keep this version at bay after Kansas City’s first two starters of the series – Luinder Avila and Noah Cameron – allowed 12 runs and four homers over five innings.

The Royals have lost four in a row — all at home, where they’re mired in a 3-11 rut.

“It’s just finding a way, competing every day,” star Bobby Witt Jr. told the Royals’ official website.

Witt had three hits Saturday, including career No. 800. He’s 7-for-18 in the last four games.

Teammate Vinnie Pasquantino is batting .333 during an eight-game hitting streak. However, he exited Saturday’s game with a right hand/hamate injury, leaving his immediate status uncertain.

–Field Level Media