Phillies 12, Braves 11

Atlanta Braves vs. Philadelphia Phillies – Box Score – April 08, 2009 – ESPN

Sickening. The Braves led 10-3 with one out in the seventh. The Phillies then proceeded to score eight runs in the inning, with no extra-base hits. It was awful. O’Flaherty, after getting the first man, sucked. Moylan was amazingly awful, giving up two walks and two singles without getting an out. Boyer walked the two men he faced. Finally, Campillo got a couple of outs, but not without three runs scoring.

I don’t really want to talk about it. It’s a shame, because it wiped out a pretty decent outing from Vazquez, and a big offensive performance. McCann, Schafer, and Diaz all hit homers, and the Braves had twelve hits, all without Chipper in the lineup (he has a bruised thumb).

71 thoughts on “Phillies 12, Braves 11”

  2. Alright, it’s over. Let’s hope this is the worst it ever gets this year.

    Now let’s win the series from Washington.

  6. If Garrett was hurt and scratched from the lineup why did he get the final plate appearance against Lidge? The official site ran a story acting like he could be out for a while.

    The Braves still had Prado available which has to be better than an injured Garrett.

  7. All of the optimism and hope the braves built up in me the last two games was just raped and left to die in in a dark alley somewhere in Philly. Fuck you bullpen.

  8. A lot of people were mentioning Alex R as the jinxer on the last thread. Actually, it was me. I’m the one you should blame for this game — I crowed about it as though we’d already won, I put up a broom on my blog before we even played the game, and I reposted my poem about how McDowell sucks as a pitching coach.

    I was basically the fan equivalent of Peter Moylan today.

  10. Games like this one make me want to fly to Atlanta and either:
    -set Bobby’s office on fire
    -set the bullpen on fire
    -give my resume to Wren to be the new coach/top notch reliever
    -all 3 former propositions

    What should I do?

    Oh and the win probability chart for the game is sadly hilarious

  11. It’s Garret’s calf that’s hurt. That shouldn’t do too much to his hitting, but you wouldn’t want him playing left field for nine innings.

    All I can say is that it can only go up from here. That was the worst half-inning of pitching I have ever seen.

  12. Ugh, I thought the lineup was going to be a problem today. What a waste. That was gross. I went to a meeting up 7-3…

  13. If no one is demoted, disabled, or waived after this, it will all have been in vain. Let’s follow through.

    I’m only partially kidding. I’ll know how much eventually. Pretty sure none of these guys would ever come back to bite us, though. Maybe some of them would catch on with the Royals and be average.

  14. Gotta love modern bullpen management. The Braves pissed that whole lead away without bothering to use either of their top two relievers. Why? Because it was the seventh inning and those are the eight and ninth inning guys! You can’t use them in the seventh – when the game is actually being decided – because, well, because they are the eight an ninth inning guys! It would be madness!

    Here’s an idea, use Soriano to put out the fire in the seventh and then use some combination of the sucky guys to get through the eighth. But wait, that would be using them out of order, and of course you absolutely cannot use them out of order.

  16. They couldnt use Gonzalez because they had used him 2 days in a row in non-save situations – /boggle.

  18. this was simply horrific. You could throw strikes and give up massive bombs and you still would have survived that inning. As bad as the bullpen was I think Chipper is a complete puss. Its day 3. I think he wanted to bat in the 9th and Bobby told him to sit down he’s hurt.

    Good job today by the offense. Evidently our pitching needs 2 touchdowns to be safe.

  19. Great. Flat-out great. Two men injured, and another tough loss. 2008 all over again. Will this team EVER stop to frustrate me?

  21. I think I’m just going to convince myself that we lost 2-1 because we have trouble scoring without Chipper. That will be easier for my brain to accept.

  23. put in perspective….we are 2-1 and just finished a series with the world champs. shitty ass loss, but still a good way to start the season. bring it nats.

  25. thanks for all the prayers!

    terrible outing, it wont be the last one of the year either. Lets move on and win the series vs the Nats.

  26. If the Phils had scored 6 runs throughout and beaten us in a normal way, 6-3, we’d easily say “great series” winning 2 of 3 in Philly.

    But winning 10-3 and losing 12-3 because half your bullpen acts like Paris Hilton trying to teach a group of Mensa thinkers, ruins this series.

    Sadly, I agree with the comment earlier that this may hurt us going into a home series with the sh**y Nationals.

  27. Its funny, Alex R. I was thinking the EXACT same thing on my way home. We had our game today at 345 so i missed the Braves, but heard the score and what happened on WFAN during the mets broadcast. If they lost today 4-2 you say, hey 2 out of 3 in philly is great, but losing this way, loses alot of the luster of the season. This bullpen is atrocious. How many more years of this do we have to watch?

    All this after we blew a 4-0 lead against a team would shouldnt have beat, and lost in the final two innings today. Very disgusted by both games

  28. Also, I pitch batting practice every single day, to save my kids arms. I have been working on a nasty slider and curve, that high school kids cant hit. I think this qualifies me to be in the Braves bullpen. I will take no money, just give me free lodging food and clothes for the year, and let me travel with the team. I can be just as effective, and I will be at a huge price cut over any other clown they have out there.

  29. I was thinking we should re-sign Kolb after the 7th. He couldn’t be any worse, could he?

  31. Bunch of whiners. One loss does not a season ending catastrophe make. Sleep on it.

  32. “One loss does not a season ending catastrophe make.”

    thanks for the advice yoda.

  33. I have the same feeling now I had after we lost that first game of the Milwaukee series (in Milwaukee) last year. We really need to bounce back and take care of business against the Nats.

  35. Reality check…sh*t happens. Let’s move on.

    Just one question: should the Braves give Moylan more time to recover?

  36. Don’t worry about this game, this kind of thing is just unlucky and (hopefully) won’t happen very often at all, we looked excellent today with the exception of that horrible bullpen performance.

  37. I don’t sweat losses like this. I sweat the team being affected by losses like this. Let’s hope Lowe has another Maddux like performance on Friday!

  38. On the bright side, we got what will probably be our most infuriating loss out of the way 3 games into the season. It’s can’t get any worse than today.

  39. What the sam hell was Boyer doing? 9 pitches, 8 balls, 6 of them the same exact pitch, which was nowhere freaking close.

    DFA somebody, and do it now. Make them pay for their ride home.

  40. And by the way, get ready for the Nattiecakes to play like it’s the freaking Super Bowl, and for us to return nothing in kind. At least it’s not in DC.

  42. As hideous and horrifying as the seventh was to watch for us all, if you would have told me before the series that the Braves would win 2 of 3, I think we all would have taken that. I think the bullpen is the last piece that comes together on a team. If things like this are happening a month into the season, then I’ll hit the panic button, but not now.

  43. God, that was brutal. I waited all frickin night for MLBTV to archive the game so I could watch it completely unspoiled. And it was fantastic for about 6.5 innings. What even happened? Moylan and Boyer forgot how to throw strikes completely? Yeesh. The real kicker is giving up another one in the 8th only to see Diaz get us one back in the 9th.

    And now Yovani Gallardo has just homered, ensuring my starter (Johnson) doesn’t get a QS.

    What a poor baseball day!

  44. I am glad that I did not see it! I doubt very seriously that this will be our most frustrating loss of the season–maybe it will be our worst loss of the month….

    At this point I would also like to see a healthy Brandon Jones rather than an Anderson–who seems ready to break down again….

  47. kc

    I really don’t see us throwing another game like that again this season. I mean, our bullpen might be bad, but being bad enough to walk in 4 runs doesn’t happen every month.

  48. lunatic96, I certainly hope so!

    Stephen, I still think Anderson will have a league average season for us.

  49. What a nightmare. Anyway, it’s done. Thank God, it’s an off day today. I wouldn’t panic yet, at least after I slept over it -yesterday, I did panic- they will take the series from the Nats and are off to a very promising start. In perspective, who would have predicted a 2-1 series against the Phillies. Some really encouraging things observed: Starting pitching 1-3 looks great. The offense was terrific. Schafer looked really good and Francoeur’s approach so far is promising. Should be a fun season.
    Go Braves!

  50. KC–I hope you are right about Anderson–I wonder if Brandon Jones could do the same?

  51. I honestly have my doubt on Brandon Jones. Of course, he has never been given a proper chance to prove himself.

  52. On a less apocalyptic note, was anyone else surprised to see Schafer miss those two balls in the OF last night? The first one (deep to left-center, off the heel of his glove) especially looked catchable, althouhg the wind was certainly making things difficult. I’m chalking it up to “being very young”-jitters, but I want to be able to expect him to make those plays in the future.

  53. I only saw a part of the meltdown via Gameday on MLB.com.

    The big issue is not throwing strikes earlier in the inning. I think at one time it was 10 to 4, bases loaded, 1 out and Moylan pitching (to Rollins?). You DON’T walk him.If you groove one 65% of the time it is an out. 5% you are double play out of the inning. If he hits a grand slam you are up 2 in the 7th with nobody on and one out.

    Pitch F/X had 2 of Moylan’s pitches as strikes. Upper outside corner, inside the box. Up enough that an umpire not calling the “high strike” could have let it go, but most umpires would have called it (did anybody watching live think the same thing?). It also had Moylan with MASSIVE MOVEMENT. His horizontal was going 14 inches (almost as wide as the plate). My gut instinct is that he was overpumped and making that horizontal sinker (pitched 90 degrees up to flat by his arm angle) move more than he could control.

    BUT STILL just throw a strike and make him hit his way on.

    And then, Boyer walks two more in. Just throw a damn strike.

  54. the 2nd one seemed as though he got a poor jump on the ball. it never showed a replay from his starting point, but off the bat, it looked like it would be very catchable. he’ll get better in the field.

  55. on a pitching note: almost every braves left hander was not happy with the umpires outside strikes. the outside corner went on for days. kj, schafer, mccann, and kotchman all looked disgusted a time or 2.

  56. 2 out of 3 is great, the way we lost the game is painful but those kind of games do happen, lets just hope not often.

    Hey, we could be the Yanks, 0-2 and the sky is falling.

  58. I’ll forgive Moylan, first time out after being rushed back from Tommy John, I imagine nerves got the best of him. He looked nervous, and the velocity was NOT there.

    I will NOT forgive Blaine Boyer. I have had high hopes for him, but he is what he is. What he is, is a younger southern version of Tyler Yates. I have waited and waited for him to develop some commnand. Folks, it aint happenning. I thought he was better than the reliever with a 5.88 ERA last year…….he isn’t.

    I will not forgive Booby Cox. I have defended him on DOB’s blog, and other places. He is a great people and clubhouse manager, but he CANNOT handle a bullpen. Examples:

    1. Why was the Irish LOOGY in there after pitching 1.1 innings last night?

    2. Why did he not start an inning with Moylan instead of bringing him in with 2 on after dry humping him the previous two games? He could have started the inning the LOOGY started off.

    3. WTF was Soriano in the 7th ?????? – biggest question of the afternoon, was he not available????? Did he have the sniffles again? Was he not a better option than Campillo or Boyer at that point. Start the 8th with Campillo, don’t bring him in with runners on.

    4. WTF was Gonzo in the 7th ???????? It would not have counted on the stats, but that was the save right there.

    5. BC on his pregame radio show said “They ought to change the save rule to 5 runs in this ballpark”. What I took that to mean is no lead is safe. Well if no lead is safe then why are you taking your foot off the gas in the 7th with a day off the next day?????????

    I will not forgive Frank Wren. He had NO faith in a Diaz/Brandon Jones/Schafer/J Anderson platton in LF/CF, so he spent 2.5 mil on Anderson. The wisdom of that is still to be determined, but it don’t look so smart now. He had no faith in Jo Jo or Charlie Morton, or Tommy Hanson to take the 4th/5th starter job(s), so he went out and overspent and over traded or the 3 new starters and Tommy G. Say what you want, but Lowe is overpaid, as is Vazquez. Yet, the bullpen, which was sooooo overworked last year did not see one bit of improvement in the offseason, in fact because he shelled out 4 mil on Glavine and G. Anderson. He should have took that money and CHERRY PICKED relievers the minute the market took a nose dive. Of course we bought high on Vasquez and DIDN’T BRING BACK OHMAN.

    He has no faith in any of the above, but he HAS faith in a rushed back Tommy John guy, a fatty red head kid with ZERO command, and Soriano, the meanest looking wuss I have ever seen.

    I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to rant, but any of us could do better than this.

  60. I left work and it was close, I got home and we had a nice comfy lead when I turned the game on… and then it all went to crap. I was a cheesed off by the inability to throw a strike by the bullpen (make them hit for their runs at least), but it’s one game, it’s early, and I don’t think the bullpen will suck this bad all year. These are mostly guys who we know can do their job, but most of them hadn’t been in a game in almost a week right? And even then those were spring games. I’ll give them a few more games to warm up before I call for heads.

  62. “BC on his pregame radio show said “They ought to change the save rule to 5 runs in this ballpark”. What I took that to mean is no lead is safe.”

    The Phils could have stocked half their lineup with five of us and still scored 8 runs that inning, which is so maddening.

  64. I’m gonna agree with part of Stupup’s assessment.

    Bobby is not alone in this, as all managers do it, but since I think it’s idiotic I’m going to complain about it.

    When a game is falling apart, like it was in the 7th inning, and you have to stop the bleeding lest a lead get away, you bring in your closer. The closer earns that title by being the guy in the pen the manager considers most likely to get outs efficiently without giving up runs. (or at least that’s what your closer should be).

    I believe 100% that it is folly to save your closer for the 9th if you’re blowing the game in the 7th.

    If an angel gave you a magic flute, and told you that you could play the flute in your time of most desperate need, and the angel would come to your aid, but only once… you’d never play it if every time you’re in desperate need of help you think to yourself “well, what if there’s sometime in the future that I’m in even more desperate need?”. You’d waste the gift.

    Bobby wastes it all the time. Why save the closer for the 9th when you may not have a lead, when you can use him in the 7th when you quite clearly do have the lead, but that lead is threatened by runners in scoring position?

    There are times in the game where the outcome is most in doubt. Use the closer then. If your other relievers blow the lead in the 9th, you still made the right move, and no one who knows anything about baseball would complain about the decision.

    They’d just complain that the GM built a crappy pen.

  66. Well, crap. I’ve sat through several of those innings as a player, watching our relievers not be able to find the plate. It’s such a frustrating thing for a fielder to sit there and watch walk after walk. It just lulls you to sleep.

    The Braves’ bullpen will be very good this year; one game isn’t going to change my opinion on that. Too bad we wasted a good outing by Javy.

    Let’s take out our frustrations on the Nats!

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