ATLANTA _ If Julio Teheran and Matt Kemp were looking to end a couple of bad trends, they had just the right opponent to take care of business against Friday when the Rockies arrived in Atlanta.
Teheran was sharp into the eighth inning and Kemp had three hits including a two-run homer in the first inning of a 5-2 Braves win to open a three-game series against the Rockies at SunTrust Park.
Kurt Suzuki added a leadoff homer in the three-run second inning and rookie Ozzie Albies reached base four times with a double, single and two walks for the Braves, who won a series opener for the first time since Aug. 4, when they beat the Marlins in the first game of their last series win.
They've lost four series and split the other since then, the split coming in a four-game road series against the Rockies Aug. 14-17.
Teheran (8-11) got his first home win since the Braves' home opener, allowing five hits and two runs with no walks and four strikeouts in 71/3 efficient innings. He didn't face more than four batters in any inning and threw 69 strikes in 88 pitches.
He had been 1-9 with a 6.98 ERA in 13 starts at SunTrust Park before Friday, compared to 6-2 with a 3.24 ERA in 12 road starts. Teheran won the Braves' home opener April 14 against the Padres, but was 0-9 with a 7.36 ERA in his past 12 home starts and had lasted more than six innings in just one of those games and allowed four or more earned runs in seven of the 12.
But one trend was superseded by another as Teheran continued his run of strong performances against the Rockies. He improved to 5-1 with a 2.21 ERA in nine career starts against the Rockies, with half of the 14 earned runs he's allowed against them came in his only loss against them in June 2014 at Coors Field.
Teheran is 5-0 with a 1.24 ERA in his other eight starts against the Rockies including three others at Coors Field, where he pitched four scoreless innings in an injury-shortened start in 2016 and worked seven scoreless innings of four-hit ball on Aug. 14.
He had a streak of 20 scoreless innings against the Rockies end in the third inning when Trevor Story hit a leadoff double and scored on a single by Charlie Blackmon
Kemp has not been much of a force in the Braves' lineup for some time now, batting .230 with just two homers and a .591 OPS in his past 32 games before Friday. He no extra-base hits and hadn't hit the ball with much authority in four games since returning from his second stint on the disabled list for another hamstring injury.
But against the Rockies, he was the Matt Kemp who's pillaged Colorado pitching since his days with the Dodgers when he was a National League MVP runner-up and Gold Glove center fielder.
That two-run home run raised his career-best totals to 42 homers and 142 RBIs in 159 games against the Rockies. His second-most in each category is 35 home runs and 109 RBIs vs. Arizona in 157 games. And this isn't a Coors Field high-altitude thing: Only 19 of his 42 homers against the Rockies came at Coors Field (78 games).
Kemp added a fifth-inning single and eighth-inning double for just his second three-hit game since June 10, raising his career average to .316 with a whopping 91 extra-base hits and an OPS well over 1.000 in 601 at-bats against the Rockies. He has 32 homers and 97 RBIs in his past 92 games against them.
Meanwhile, Suzuki also homered off Rockies starter Chad Bettis (0-1) to give the veteran catcher his 15th homer in just his 191st at-bat for the Braves. This after he totaled 13 homers in 778 at-bats over the previous two seasons.
Suzuki matched the career-high 15 homers he hit in 570 at-bats with Oakland in 2009 and did it in one-third the number of at-bats.
