“Whether you realize it or not, you might put a little extra pressure on yourself to get off to a hot start with a new team,” Olson said. “I didn’t know it at the time, but I realized it last year. I think [Murphy] had just a little bit of that early on. It’s natural.”
It’s seemingly a short-term affliction for some like Murphy, who recorded three more extra-base hits to help the Braves earn a 9-3 win over the Royals on Saturday at Kauffman Stadium. The veteran catcher tallied two doubles and homered for the second time in five days.
“He’s on a nice roll here,” Braves manager Brian Snitker said. “He’s a strong man.”
Murphy, Olson (2022) and Austin Riley (’22) are the only other Braves to record at least two doubles and at least one homer twice in a game within the same season since 2010. The only other Atlanta players to do it twice during any season since 2000 are Brian McCann (’09) Marcus Giles (’03) and Chipper Jones (’01 and ’03).
McCann (July 26 and 30, 2009) and Murphy are the only members of this group to have accomplished the feat within a span of just one week.
This early success has helped Murphy find comfort with the club that acquired him from the A’s this past winter. The deal reunited him with Olson, who the Braves gained via a March 2022 trade with Oakland.
“Getting hot is always good, but doing it early shows the rest of the guys that you belong with them and can help,” Murphy said. “I’m doing well right now. I just want to try to stay consistent.”
To say Murphy has been red-hot might be an understatement. He has gone 9-for-19 with six doubles and three home runs going back to Monday. His production has helped the Braves win five straight games and compensate for the absence of their other veteran catcher, Travis d’Arnaud, who hasn’t played since suffering a concussion on April 8.
Murphy’s hot stretch hasn’t been a fluke. Seven of the 11 balls he has put in play since Monday have had an exit velocity of 100 mph or higher. This includes each of Saturday’s three hits. His first-inning RBI double came off the bat at 106.9 mph, and his two-run double in the third was clocked at 111.3 mph. The fifth-inning homer he hit off Royals starter Kris Bubic cut through a strong wind at 105.8 mph.
“[Murphy] is one of the better guys I’ve ever met,” Braves starting pitcher Bryce Elder said. “He’s just real straightforward. You know what you’re going to get from him every day. To see him start to swing it, we knew it was coming, but to see it this way, it’s awesome to watch.”
Murphy’s contributions in Saturday’s win included helping Elder navigate through 5 1/3 innings, and now Elder has an impressive 1.53 ERA through three starts.
While the recent flurry of extra-base hits have drawn the most attention, Murphy has also lived up to his reputation as an elite defensive catcher. His 16.3 defensive fWAR (Fangraphs’ Wins Above Replacement Model) ranks second among all MLB catchers since the start of 2022, trailing only the Phillies’ J.T. Realmuto (18.8).
Though Murphy came to Atlanta as a 2021 Gold Glove Award winner who was widely regarded as one of the game’s best defensive catchers, some Braves fans didn’t approve of their team acquiring him in a three-team trade that sent bat-first catcher William Contreras to the Brewers.
Some of those same fans made noise when Murphy went 3-for-20 in his first seven games with Atlanta. But the critics have been pretty quiet since Monday, when the 28-year-old catcher tallied two doubles and smacked a walk-off homer to cap a 10-inning win over the Reds.
“To me, that was kind of his coming-out-to-the-Braves party,” Olson said. “I think he’s going to be taking off here.”
