Atlanta Braves vs. Washington Nationals – Box Score – September 26, 2009 – ESPN
I’d really like to thank the Nats for putting PTG Orr in the starting lineup again. Orr did more for the Braves in these last two games than he ever did in a Braves uniform. Today he threw a ball away, an “infield single” in the first that scored two runs, putting the Braves up 4-0. Only one of the four runs was “unearned”, but let’s just say that the Nats aren’t a good defensive team. The Braves added another “unearned” run in the second to go up 5-0.
Tommy Hanson had an odd game. He only allowed four hits and one walk, but he had bad timing; the last of the hits was a homer following a hit and a walk, scoring three runs in the third and cutting the lead to 6-4 at the time. But Hanson had no problems for then on. He wound up striking out seven in seven innings, and is now 11-4 with a 2.98 ERA.
Gonzalez came in to pitch the eighth, and allowed a walk but struck out two and preserved the two-run lead. And then the Braves broke it open. Chipper doubled in McLouth, then McCann seemingly ended the rally with his 21st homer. Escobar doubled in Gorecki, then came in on an ACHE single to make it 11-4.
Bobby brought in O’Flaherty, who after striking out Dunn allowed three straight infield singles, which is pretty hard to do. He then gave up a sac fly, then Bobby brought in Soriano to pitch to one batter with two out and a six-run lead. Whatever. He got a strikeout.
The Braves had thirteen hits, with five different batters with two each. In addition to McCann’s homer, they had five doubles by five different batters. That’s how you do it.
Despite all the cyperink spilled over their usage, it does look like both Gonzo and Sori are going to make it to the end of the season with some effectiveness left. My complements to their surgeons.
I hope that will still be the case should we reach the playoffs.
Mac,
Do you know how long we have Hanson and JJ under contract?
Keep hope dead!
They’re year to year. JJ is under team control to 2013, Hanson to 2015.
My hope is still very dead. It would be less dead if the Cards and Dodgers hand’t 90% clinched their divisions.
Who can have hope in Atlanta, when you are preparing for Noah’s Ark?
[Eeyore]
It’s hopeless.
[/Eeyore]
Haha. Reminds me of Frenchy.
Funnily enough, Pete Orr and Jeff Francoeur both hit exactly .300 in their rookie year, 2005.
And both of us have helped us FAR more by being off the team this year: Frenchy, whose departure keyed our second-half renaissance, and Orr, who seems determined to hand us this series.
Thanks, Baby Braves!
I don’t see how the Braves can lose another game this season.
Timo: Lowe has two starts yet.
10,
And the Marlins are no pushovers.
Keep hope dead!
Playoff or no playoff, I am very proud of these braves.
Mac, I think Bobby wants to see Sori getting his 100k.
I think Timo meant the Braves can’t lose another game and have any shot at the playoffs.
Which I tend to agree with.
I will feel good about this if the Rockies lose tonight.
Without looking, who is the qualified Braves leader in OBP?
PW, it’s Chipper as usual. Diaz has only 409 PAs.
Here’s a better question- who is the Braves’ OBP leader including all players? (No peeking!)
Chipper I would think…looks…hmmm. Interesting indeed.
never mind. had to look a little harder.
I think Diaz does qualify.
You need 3.1 PA per game to qualify, which would now be 477 PA. So Diaz doesn’t qualify, Mac.
As for the non-qualifying leader, it’s… Manny Acosta’s .500 OBP in 2 PA. Which is only fair, as he lets so many other people on base.
And the Cards have jumped out to a 3-0 lead in the top of the 1st.
Fish are gonna kick us in the mouth.
I bet the Rocks play .500 ball to finish out…and Braves lose 2 of 3 to the damn Marlins.
You need 3.1 PA/TmG to qualify for the batting title. You only need 2.0 PA/TmG to qualify for the team lead in rate stats. Diaz does qualify. And he’s the leader. Here’s the list:
1. Matt Diaz – .398
2. Chipper Jones – .391
3. Yunel Escobar – .376
4. Casey Kotchman – .354
5. Nate McLouth – .353
6. Martin Prado – .350
7. Brian McCann – .348
8. Garret Anderson – .308
9. Kelly Johnson – .302
10. Jeff Francoeur – .282
And by the way, assuming the Braves play 162 games, you’ll need 324 PA’s at the end of the season. Guess how many Jeff Francoeur has.
Acosta’s OBP is good, but he has nothing on Hudson.
.300 .417 .600 1.017
Where’s Big Eleven boy? I just saw a keystone commercial during the Penn State game lol.
Diaz is also the team leader in OPS+. Well, LaRoche kills him (and everybody else) but he only has half as much PA. Diaz is having a monstrous year!
I hated it when we traded you away, but win a game for your hometown team.
Tulowitzki’s arm is as strong as Blauser’s.
Hope is a great evil.
I really reallly hate the Rockies.
Was 3-0, Cardinals. Now 3-3. Keep hope dead.
Diaz is the leader in AVG, OBP, SLG, OPS, OPS+, etc..
LaRue homers, 4-3 Cardinals in the 7th.
Cardinals solo homer to take the lead
Why do you run for Holliday? With 2 out, there’s about a 1 in 10000 chance a set of circumstances developes where Lugo scores but Holliday doesn’t. If this goes extras, the genius has outsmarted himself again.
Wainwright closing in on 130 pitches. Did the St. Louis bullpen not show up to the stadium or something?
Adam Wainwright, another former Braves helping us out – they were some filthy curves.
@33,
I think Wainwright did o.k. for himself in the 8th.
But if I was one game from clinching, no way I would have left him out there that long.
Oh, Joooooooooonnnnnnnn….
Iowa Hawkeyes vs. Penn State Nittany Lions Box Score, September 26 2009 – NCAA College Football – ESPN
This never would have happened if Joe Paterno was alive.
Ludwick goes deep pinch-hitting for Wainwright. 6-3 Cards, middle of the 9th!
KEEP HOPE ALIVE!!!
Thank you Ryan Ludwick. ST. L. 6, Rockies 3, top of 9.
18-10 with 8 minutes left, not sure if that’s Big 10 football or basketball.
jeez, from the comments, I could swear that a few folks on here have… hope.
@36, that joke never gets, um, old
Close it out Cards! 6-3 bottom of the 9th in Coors
Cards Win 6-3.
2 1/2 back.
Hope is clawing her way out of the coffin, Mac.
Cardinals win! Braves 2.5 back with eight to play!
Mac’s Top 10:
1. Alabama
2. Texas
3. Florida
4. Boise (!)
5. Va Tech
6. LSU
7. Cincy
8. Iowa
9. Oklahoma
10. Ohio State
21-10
A dream is crushed…
no hope, btw I hate ND
Is there enough Keystone Light to drown Jon K’s sorrows?
Marlins = End of Braves’ season.
I’ve gotta’ say Mac that your Top 10 looks pretty good, with the exception of LSU. I don’t think they’ve proven much so far – especially today.
Keystone Light.
Always Smooth.
Even when you’re Nittany Lions aren’t.
LSU doesn’t look very good — but they’ve won. I can’t move them way down after a loss after three teams in the top ten lost to unranked teams.
I having a really hard time keeping hope dead. Really tough. If this were AA, I would be calling my sponser from outside the liquor store.
This is going to be really awesome or really crushing.
if theyve lost to an unranked team, they have no business in the top 10 through 4 games. Rankings should adjust more than they do on a week to week basis.
You can make an argument for Oregon as a top ten team — they lost to Boise at Boise, and they’re a top five team now.
CSG, nobody in my top ten this week lost to an unranked team. Three teams in last week’s did this week.
#45 – I’ll just say having Ohio State in the Top 10 ahead of USC – you know when USC beat them in their house – is a curious decision.
Rankings at this point of the season are pretty tough. Not a lot of data points. I thought Cal was good this year until about 1:30 this afternoon.
Still no hope here. Enjoying the moment, though.
I’m with Robert @53. Although I’m still of the opinion that we won’t catch the Rockies even if we win out.
If we are 1 game out going into the Washington series, there’s hope. Until then I’ll hear none of it.
@53-
Love the analogy or metaphor or whatever that would be called, and I will go you one better. I’m like Denis Leary in Rescue Me, sitting in a bar, already bought the drink, and I’m going to sit there and stare at it and dare myself not to imbibe… Of course it didn’t work for him and I don’t suspect it is going to work for me either.
And then you start drinking and get your entire recovering alcoholic family drinking too.
The Cards still have something to play for tomorrow too.
The cards and phillies are seprated by 1/2 game. If the cards let the phillies catch them, they have to play don’t get home field advantage in the first round of the playoffs.
I’m hopin’, dammit!
@ 61-
Yeah boy! It’s all downhill from here.
@58 I am still keeping hope dead, but this team is making me very very proud of being a Braves fan. It’s like seeing your child not giving up, and you would be proud of him or her regardless of the final result.
Double that, kc.
If they can just go 5-3 over the last eight, or even 4-4 they will have gotten all that I could have hoped for out of the season.
TCU should be in your top 10, Mac. They’re actually better than Boise.
I also agree with Robert–USC should be ahead of OSU. And while LSU has looked pretty bad, that tough win at Washington is looking a helluva lot better since the Huskies took care of the Trojans last week.
I’m still not declaring “hope” until the Braves crack the 2-games back marker. I still don’t think they can lose again this year…
I am officially jumping on the hope train. How can you not have hope 2 games back in the loss column with 8 to go? The Braves should could easily go something like 6-2 the rest of the way. The difficulty is having teams like the Cardinals, Brewers, and Dodgers play the Rockies seriously enough to hold them to a 3-4 record. I’ll give Bobby his due credit for this late surge. This team looked dead during the 5 game losing streak and it looked like the players were starting to quit on Bobby. But he somehow got it turned around. (No doubt the pitching staff had a lot to do with it.)
I wouldn’t worry about the Brewers since they seem to be handling the Phillies quite nicely.
The Dodgers might be more of a problem, but the Cubs reserves beat up on the Mets at this stage last year to blow the division for them.
Even before the Rockies game was over last night, “Pythagorus” had Braves with 4 extra wins and Rockies with 1 less, thus putting us ahead in WC.
Oh, the joy of having Bobby Cox as a manager.
@53 & 60
Goooooood… let the the hope flow through you..