Whatever reason Bobby had for starting Eddie Perez, he made a good call. Eddie had a great day — the best of his career, maybe — going 4-5 with two homers, three runs and three RBI. Chipper went 3-5 (and is now up to .244) and also had a homer, driving in four; Marcus was 2-2 with a walk, three runs scored, before leaving the game. In the fourth inning. The Braves led 10-0 at that point and cruised from there. Also doing well was Furcal, who had three hits.
Russ Ortiz was terrific for the first five innings, then fell apart in the sixth (with a 10-0 lead), leaving with three runs in and the bases loaded. Gryboski got the last out of the inning. In the continuing mystery of Bobby’s usage pattern of Juan Cruz, Tom Martin pitched the seventh despite the seven-run lead, and Tim Drew pitched the last two innings. Why use your only lefty, who pitched yesterday, to pitch a full inning in a blowout? The Braves do have an off-day tomorrow, but still…
Next up, the beer teams come to town, three with the Brewers and three with the Cardinals. The latter is a possible playoff preview, and in fact would be the first round matchup if the current standings hold… The Phillies beat the Dodgers (Brad Penny left injured after only 2/3 of an inning) and stay 5 1/2 out. The Marlins and Mets lost, and are eight and eleven back respectively. Good job mortgaging your future, there, guys.
The Braves are about to enter the part of their schedule that will, IMO
Hey Mac, you know what, I strongly believe the Braves will take over the #2 seed from the Dodgers with the way the Braves and the Dodgers are playing right now. What this will lead us to? Assuming the Phillis, the Giants and the Padres will not overtake the Cubs, we will meet Wood and Prior all over again!!!
I thought maybe Cox wanted to see Martin in a low-leverage situation against some right-handed hitting, but only Andy Green was a righty of those Martin faced.
Incidentally, what a horrible, horrible team the D’Backs are right now. Their active roster is among the worst I’ve ever seen. I’d say it’s at the level of an expansion team, but it’s truly worse than that. Baerga chugged down to first base on a single and looked like he was going to keel over. It was funny looking at him next to Julio and realizing that Julio’s got a brighter future as a player….
These Diamondbacks remind me of the Padres from last year, only with fewer good prospects and no plans to bring in good talent. Ouch.