Somebody forgot to pack the bats on the plane from Florida. Julio Teheran battled but was not at his best — in six innings, he only struck out two men, against one walk. The whole game basically came down to the fourth inning, when the Brewers strung together some hits and put two on the board; that was all the scoring that either team would do.
Yovani Gallardo is a reasonably good pitcher, and the Braves missed two solo shots by a matter of inches — Freddie Freeman sliced around the right-field foul pole by a few feet in the 8th, and Chris Johnson hooked around the left-field foul pole by a few feet in the 9th. But still, the Braves only got five hits in fair territory, four singles and a double by Johnson. Most nights that just isn’t going to cut it.
Pickles Schlosser was easily the nicest surprise of the game, notching the last five outs for the Braves by way of a GIDP, strikeout, groundout, and lineout. Nice work in his major league debut.
Oh well, tomorrow’s another day.
Well Pickles performance made it only a half-sour day.
Yeah, he was cool as a cucumber out there.
Dooooooomed! (And hi by the way. It’s been a while since I’ve been on here!)
Welcome back to Bravesland, Rob.
Was just in your former hood this past week. (Ultra Fest, oy!)
Mets.
Listened to a good bit of the game today. Not a lot of leather being flashed by the good guys, from the sound of it.
ububba,
That music will always remind me of Miami. How many overdoses this year? And how are things in NY? (Logical follow-up question.)
#7
Dunno, but it feels like I overdosed (on SPL/dB). My ears are still ringing, and I only did 2 days of it.
I think the biggest issue at Ultra Fest this year was that, on Friday, a big group of gatecrashers rushed one of the fences & trampled a security guard, who’s still in the hospital. As of this week, the local politicos are debating the event’s future. (I’m sure there were arrests & hospital visits, but I really don’t know the extent of it.)
Still, that event brings in about $100M to that town each year & I have a hard time believing that Miami (considering its rather unique history) is suddenly going to turn down that kind of annual windfall. If anything, they’ll just hold up the event for more money to hire off-duty cops, etc.
New York? Still too cold. This winter will not end, so Miami was a relative pleasure. (Cue the “Glad I live in Cali” spiel, right?)
I DVR’d this one but I think I’m just gonna delete it.
0-162. IMO.
There are four starter in today’s lineup that I could easily see failing to break a .300 OBP: BJ Upton, Dan Uggla, Evan Gattis and Andrelton Simmons
I really think Andrelton is going to be one of the best offensive players on the team. Not sure what that says about our offense…
If a guy that posted 248/296/396 last year is one of the best offensive players on the team, without taking a MAJOR leap forward with the bat, we are screwed. I think a lot of the ERMAHGADTHEPITCHING!!! freak out over losing Medlen and Beachy has papered over the real concern with this team, which is that four out of eight non-pitching starters resembled somewhat Jeff Franceour at the plate.
Obviously I’m predicting (err, wishing) for a major leap forward for Simmons. We’re an 85 win team at best unless the offense improves over last year.
I think the team we fielded today will finish under .500, perhaps pretty far. Sadly.
Sigh.
@chief
Fairly certain you’ve been below .500 in your predictions so I’ll take that bet.
Some people look at the glass half full, some look at it half empty, and some just bust the glass & slash their wrists.
I’m pretty sure that Chief Nocahoma has never expressed a belief that the Braves would win a single game.
Ahhh, Opening Day…the smell of the grass, the crack of the bat, the hand-wringing of the Concern Troll. Renewal.
@17 That’s wisdom right there. If you know Gallardo’s history against the Braves, you would not be surprised by today’s result. The guy owns the Braves for some reasons.
Great start because we are obviously DOOMED!!!
Will Schlosser be our new Moylan?
Surely Chief Nocahoma is a regular in disguise.
@8, SPL/dB indeed.
And yeah, Chief is an anti-canary. Bet on the opposite.
That said, good to see you posting Chief!
This Marlins/Rockies broadcast is just.. unbearable. There aren’t words for it. This Sportscenter clown has never watched a baseball game. He’s asking the stupidest questions. It’s like Chip Caray calling a cricket match. I can’t take it.
Did anyone else notice that Horacio Ramirez is the Braves’ replay coordinator?
Sounds like Ryan Braun was okay with the replay reversal:
“I had a pretty good idea I was out,” Braun said. “For all of us, we just hope they get it right, and they did get it right. Whether we’re on the good end or bad end, I think as players all we can hope for is that they’re able to get it right.”
To be fair, that’s now his opinion on everything.
The Chris Johnson at bats looked really good. He’s probably not a .320 hitter, but…I don’t think the wheels are just going to fall off either. Dude’s on a mission. A weird, metal-rage mission.
I honestly think CJ will be fine. While he may not be able to repeat what he did last year, he will not be falling off the cliff as predicted by most people. He and Freddie are probably the more consistent hitters we have in our lineup and I think it is the reason why Fredi is batting them third and fourth. I would prefer putting Simmons in the second spot over BJ though.
Note I saw on ESPN:
The Brewers are 5-2 against the Braves since the beginning of 2013 and all five wins were shutouts.
Weird!
Also, I thought the Braves were shutout to start 2003 and won 100 games. Am I wrong? I seem to remember a very bad opening series in Montreal.
“Did anyone else notice that Horacio Ramirez is the Braves’ replay coordinator?”
YES! WAAAAAAAAT??! Was he that good of an organizational soldier that you give him this job? I’m anxiously awaiting the day when he screws us out of a HR or something by messing up replay coordination.
DOOOOOOOOOOMED!
They got shut out on opening day in 2012, lost the next three games as well, and then rebounded to finish 94-68.
28- Not on Opening Day (although they did lose 10-2), but they were shut out each of the next two games. Then in Game 5, the Marlins nosed them out 17-1 and the Phillies nipped them 16-2 in Game 9.
@29
Maybe he was. How hard could it be?
Yesterday’s game – definitely – Meh. If the Nats really wanted to grab the division, they should have traded for Gallardo instead of Pfister and just started him for a8 games against us.
(And yes, I mean on no days rest. They’d go 18-0.)
@29 Of course he was. He netted us Rafael Soriano after all.
Why wouldn’t you hire Horacio Ramirez to run replay? It’s not like he actively undermined the team. He wasn’t a very good pitcher, but he gave us a few good years. Now that he’s out of baseball, give him a job in the replay room. Man needs work; he was a good Brave. Sheesh.
Who cares. Do we not think he’s capable of looking at a replay monitor is slow motion?
@ajcbraves: #Braves are 2-8 w/ .192 average and 13 runs in past 10 games vs. Brewers, w/ 7 of those runs in 1 game. Shut out in 6 of past 9.
Today is a new day though.
HoRam can’t possibly give up a HR out of the replay booth.
I do like the fact that the Braves seem to be loyal to their former players, and former Braves seem to have a good enough feeling about the team to want to work for them after their playing days are done. It suggests that the organization is actually a decent place to work.
I really can’t feel bad about Horacio. He wasn’t a great pitcher, but the big problem was that the team thought he could be a starting pitcher even though he could only get lefties out. He could have been a fine LOOGY for years. But for some reason, no team actually used him that way — in his career, he faced three times as many righties as lefties. In the meantime, he got us Soriano and he pitched in the big leagues for nearly a decade.
We hired Horacio because someone has to coordinate replays and Horacio can throw batting practice from the left side. IOW, he’s mainly there to throw batting practice.
I know Fredi is gonna Fredi and all that, but by batting BJ second instead of his brother he is hurting the team. And who is going to ever throw Justin a fastball with Dan fricking Uggla on deck. It ain’t particle physics, just put some combination of your best four hitters in the the top four spots.
Being a good baseball player is not a prerequisite to being good at other things in life.
True. But playing at the highest level probably helps you make judgment calls about replays.
@41
I agree. Plus, we will reveiw calls about 10-15 times this year. Good for Horacio.
I’m glad they didn’t offer it to Chipper.
FWIW, Mets closer Bobby Parnell out with a partially torn MCL in his right elbow.
Enter Jose Valverde.
@43
Please forward all closers news to me before posting on blog. #fantasycloserhoarder
I don’t know if this would be considered news, but Jose Valverde sucks.
Yep… the injury bug is everywhere. Vlad Guerrero throws out the first pitch for the Angels (don’t worry ryan c… he isn’t closing for them) and Don Baylor breaks his leg catching it.
http://espn.go.com/los-angeles/mlb/story/_/id/10707584/los-angeles-angels-hitting-coach-don-baylor-injured-ceremonial-first-pitch
Game thread.