ESPN.com – MLB – Box Score – Cubs at Braves
The Braves need to rest John Smoltz. There’s nothing to play for and he doesn’t have anything to prove. It’s not his fault, he’s just used up trying to keep this team in contention while the rest of the rotation collapsed and the bullpen continually let him down. I propose that the six runs he allowed today be divided between Hudson and Kim Jong-Il and the loss go to Reitsma.
John gave up a two-out, three-run homer to Jacque Jones in the first, then a none-out, three-run homer to Derrek “Splinters” Lee in the third, and was then relieved by Villarreal. Smoltz has an apparent groin strain, another reason he should be shut down. The Parade of Crappy Relievers allowed two more runs, one by Ray and one by Franklin, who is surely the crappiest of them all and shall get a hat as a prize once I find his mailing address and a crappy enough hat. The Vulture, Devine, Barry, Moylan, and Paronto all emerged unscathed.
The Braves had ten hits. Diaz was the only one with more than one, going 2-4 and scored two runs, and as punishment will sit tomorrow. Sitting today was LaRoche, for no readily apparent reason. Ward doesn’t even get the platoon advantage. Now the Phillies.
well… that didn’t go so well tonight!
I was finally able to sit down and watch the game peacefully and we play awful!
They said LaRoche was sitting because of his hamstring.
Why IS Wayne Franklin on this team?
The good news: The bullpen only allowed 2 runs in 7 innings, and appear to (finally) no longer be the main problem. If nothing else, if we can resign Wick and Baez, we’ll have a decent core with Devine, Paronto, Vulture, and Cormier. And possibly Kevin Barry, but only the good one. Not evil zombie 6 ER in .1 IP Kevin Barry
Hey, even though the Braves won’t be in the playoffs and will likely end the season below .500, here is our chance to take the Phillies and the Marlins with us to the couch when October baseball starts.
I’d rather see the Phils or Marlins in the playoffs, but I also kinda don’t care. I’d root for Maddux, Furcal, etc., if I had to.
As I’ve said before, go Dawgs.
I think I have a “Lobstermen do it better” trucker hat around here somewhere you can send him. Or a Woodmen of the World hat since his pitches apparently really like to find wood.
Joey T, out for 4-6 weeks, whoo! Go Dawgs! Hopefully that’s long enough to lose the starting job. I know it’s irrational but I just don’t like that guy.
As long as the Mets don’t make the world series, I’ll consider this season a semi-victory.
Am I the only one really worried about Brian Jordan the Brave in 2007? Am I just paranoid?
Hey guys, football is back!
Amen, Dan. As long as it ain’t the Mets, I can live with it. I guess I’ll have to root for the Fish at this point. Haven’t rooted for the Phillies since The Bull refused to sign my baseball at Fulton Co. But I must admit, it is sheer joy to watch Ryan Howard this year.
Smitty, they should have a double header every Monday night.
urlhix,
The reason you don’t like Joe T is because, unlike Stafford, he has very little talent. Hopefully, Stafford will continue to improve by the time the Vols come to town. Despite the 3 INTs, I remain optimistic about him.
Funny, one time I got Luzinski’s autograph without even trying. I was in the new Philly stadium a couple years ago & before the game started I went to Bull’s BBQ just beyond the right-field bullpens. I didn’t realize it, but I was in the wrong line for food—I’d accidentally gotten in the Greg Luzinski autograph queue. I thought someone was going to ask me for my order; instead, The Bull was standing in front of me with a Sharpie.
It was an awkward moment because I haven’t collected autographs since I was a kid, and I certainly didn’t care about getting his signature. But I had him sign my scorebook for no other reason that I didn’t want him to feel dissed by a guy who’d much rather be getting a pulled-pork sandwich.
Dan, tomorrow’s game thread leader is mostly about Jordan. I’m a little reluctant to post it, actually, but I’m frustrated by that situation.
ububba,
You are probably right. I don’t like his lack of talent. But I really don’t like this sense of entitlement that he seems to exude. Just because he had some dream about playing against Florida when he was 8 years old, and his family has played for UGA, he should get the gig. Well, he did get that dream game against Florida last year, and sucked, so can we send him out to pasture already? I know he loves the Dawgs and I salute him for that, but the best thing he could do for the team would be to fall on his sword, in my harsh but humble opinion.
That a hilarious story about getting The Bull to sign your scorecard. Amazing how someone’s attitude changes when their business depends on them not being a jerk, huh? I’m sure the guy was just having a bad day when I tried to get him to sign my baseball, but it’s one of those things that stick with a kid. Kind of how I’ve always loved Burt Reynolds because he was so nice to me when they were filming Hooper across the street from my elementary school. Some celebs get it, some don’t. Oddly, one of the nicest “famous people” I’ve met was Don King. That guy was as gracious as it gets.
A funny Bobby Cox quote about smoltzie that I just have to share:
“He tweaked (the groin) a little bit and got some balls up,” Cox said.
http://www.forbes.com/technology/ebusiness/feeds/ap/2006/09/11/ap3008868.html
-n
Smoltz will get his rest. However, the pitcher who needs to be shut down for awhile is Ray; his ERA after the All-Star break is approaching the Reitsmasphere as it is over 8:00…
ulrhix,
Doesn’t surprise me about Burt Reynolds. I recently met a guy in my business who had for years worked with Burt, mostly in the post-1976 glory years when he was the No. 1 box-office star. He worked on a ton of those flicks, the good & the bad. Had a million funny stories, a lot of them in Atlanta. (Burt owned a restaurant/bar in the old Omni International, now the CNN Center, called Burt’s Place.)
I’d always been mildly fascinated with Burt Reynolds (I grew up on his movies) & wanted to know if he was a cool guy or another ego-driven loony.
He told me that Burt was the greatest guy you could ever work for—incredibly loyal, funny, down-to-earth with his people. He was a star & he knew it, but he took care of his people & fans. He fully understood that his audience made him who he was. He always remembered that, before he became a leading man, he was simply a stuntman.
Here’s actually a nice story about the Marlins…
http://www.usatoday.com/sports/baseball/nl/marlins/2006-09-11-cover-story_x.htm
for those of you who’ve followed the 1914 stuff, there’s a cool site called http://www.baseballrace.com that turns pennant races into literal races. watching 1914, 1991, and 1993 cheered me up this morning 🙂
Dayn Perry has an article out about Chipper…
http://msn.foxsports.com/mlb/story/5955430
interesting read from Mark bradley:
http://www.ajc.com/blogs/content/shared-blogs/ajc/sportscolumns/entries/2006/09/07/tip_your_cap_to.html
although i’m sure many of you have already read it
Looks like mets fan has even invaded the comments to that article.
Sweet article about Chipper. He was Mr. Brave for many of the years during the streak, and it would be great to see him get into the HOF.
Nice article by Bradley. I for one am not bitter about this season. I’m thankful for 14 years of championship caliber baseball.
Chipper is my favorite Brave. I wish him better health, a starter or 2, a left fielder and a new bullpen so that he can re start his streak of 1st place finishes.
We need a Jeff Porter doghouse. Too many damn injuries this year! Ok. It’s not really Jeff’s fault, but the rash of injuries is just mind boggling. I love Smoltz, but maybe he should shut up in the papers for a while since he has stumbled big time in the last few weeks when the team needed him most. I’m all for spoiling the Phillies’ and Marlins’ chances at the wild card. I feel pretty confident the Mets aren’t going to win the World Serires this year with their old, beat up pitching staff.
we should have gone with this lineup last night, in this order
Pratt
Ward
Pena Jr
Prado
Orr
Thorman
Jordan
Langy
Smoltz
Devine has his ERA down to 15.75!
If he shaves another run or two off, he can be next year’s Reitsma!
WSBTV.com – News – Former Brave Busted On Cocaine Charges
No, it wasn’t Otis Nixon.
Nixon sold it to him
Second in the rookie of the year voting in 1989, right behind teammate Jerome Walton. Of course they were both Cubs, so neither approached the success of their rookie years again.
The immortal Derek Lilliquist finished fourth that year in what has to be one of the crappiest rookie classes. Skates hit .315/.415/.533 for us and finished 11th in the MVP voting despite the 97 losses.
You know, if Pratt hit leadoff, he wouldn’t ground into so many double plays.
The Bradley column offers some real sharp perspective. Hard to argue with that one. Real good column.
Kim Jong-Il has been even more incompetent as a Cardinal than as a Brave, giving up 8 HR in 22 IP. Why on Earth is he still in the majors?
I also wish Chipper the best of health, and I’d modify Johnny’s request to say that Chipper should be the left fielder; he’s now at the point where he can’t keep playing 3B without hurting himself.
I have, or at least I think I still have somewhere, a Pabst Blue Ribbon hat that my girlfriend threw up on after her 21st birthday (no, I wasn’t wearing it at the time…) I’d truly like to send it to Yates, but if you want it for Franklin, I’d oblige.
#34, only problem with that is the Braves traded away all their best 3rd base prospects in the past year.
I dont know what I would do with Andruw after this year. Is the threat of him in our lineup and his defense worth $13-15mil per year anymore? Or would trading him create to big of a hole in our lineup?
I dont think his .259 mark is worth it, but is the power threat and his defense may be. Trading him would free up a ton of salary room and we could probably land a great starter for him, but then we would be left with Langy, Frenchy, Diaz, and KJ for an outfield.
Its a toss up to me, I would hate to see him in another uniform though.
You guys must have missed today’s “Notes” on atlantabraves.com, or else you wouldn’t still be talking about Tyler Yates being a bad pitcher. The headline: Yates Thrives in Setup Role. Okay, I think I must have missed something.
http://atlanta.braves.mlb.com/NASApp/mlb/news/article.jsp?ymd=20060911&content_id=1657577&vkey=news_atl&fext=.jsp&c_id=atl
The most interesting thing about that “Notes” article is that he laments the previous numbers of the staff that only saved 22 out of 32, then lauds the current makeup that has now saved 11 out of 16. Hmmm. Seems to me that if you doubled the most recent numbers, 11 saves in 16 chances, well you come up with the same numbers as before, 22 saves in 32 chances.
Even with that, I’m much more comfortable with Wickman at the end of the bullpen.
If smotlz hadn’t tanked his last 3 starts, the Braves would be over .500 and a 2.5 out of the wildcard.
If…What if Smoltz hadnt of won 8 of 9 starts before that, or what if Chipper and Giles would actually play instead of sitting on the bench in the dugout, or what if Hudson would actually pitch like he did in Oakland, or what if JS would actually get us some pitchers, or what if…
you cant throw the blame at Smoltz
you cant throw the blame at Smoltz
I don’t think anybody blames Smoltz (at least I hope not), but that’s just how it’s been this year. As soon as one hole is patched, another springs a leak. Just as the rest of our rotation comes together, our ace falls apart.
It’s added up to a pretty frustrating year for everyone involved.
I wouldn’t assume you could get a great starter for Andruw. Who do you think would be available? The White Sox need a centerfielder, but do they really have anyone that looks that great? I fear that the only kind of starters you can trade for would be someone like Zito who, given the Braves luck, would do a Hudson.