The streak is dead! Eight days after Freddie Freeman treated us to a walk off hit in the 10th inning, the Braves finally remembered how to win again. It wasn’t one of those offensive outbursts that we’re all hoping we’ll get to see soon and the team still turns into pumpkins when runners get into scoring position, but a win’s a win and no one can take it away from us.
Gavin Floyd made his Braves debut and turned in a performance worthy of the Good April Braves starting pitchers. He went 7 innings, giving up 1 run on 6 hits. The Braves turned some nice double plays behind him, too, which was nice after Monday night’s defensive miscues cost them that game. Nobody was expecting anything like what Floyd provided in his first start back from Tommy John (one day shy of the anniversary of his surgery). He impressed his manager so much that Fredi hinted after the game that Floyd would get another start in 5-6 days. So, there’s that to speculate about.
David Carpenter pitched the eighth and looked pretty sharp, striking out two in a perfect inning. He picked up the win when Regression came through in the bottom of the inning, breaking up a tie game with a hit—an actual HIT—with a runner in scoring position. Craig Kimbrel looked like his long layoff didn’t bother him, and he picked up his ninth save of the season by completely blowing the Cards away. He was pretty filthy.
Justin Upton really enjoys hitting solo home runs, and back in the 2-hole of the lineup he hit a no-doubter in the 4th for the Braves’ first run. We face Wainwright tonight, so getting that win was actually pretty big. He and Mike Minor will face off at 7:00.
We weathered a 7-game losing streak and are back in first place. I don’t want to sound greedy, but let’s go for two in a row!
And it’s always good to take a series vs. the Cards. You never know how important that may be down the road.
Natspo(s) delenda est. Let’s clobber Wainwright.
I enjoy watching JUpton’s HRs. Probably almost as much as he does!(Zing! Cheap shot alert!) But seriously, it’s majestic. Such a short, compact swing. He doesn’t even follow through beyond his left shoulder. You see that and its obvious why he was such a scout darling.
Thanks, ‘Rissa. Go Braves.
Pena in there against a tough lefty.
Pretty sure Wainwright is a righty.
Pena again batting 9th. No Uggla.
very glad to see Carpenter have a great outing, when he is really on thats a nasty twosome with him in the 8th and Kimbrel in the 9th.
Seems like every single Braves hitter starts the count 0-2 before they even begin the at-bat…for Uggla they might as well go ahead and put it up on the scoreboard.
Dan Haren clearly still has some Nat sympathies.
Really no reason to bench Uggla. At this point he needs to be released , it’s best for both parties. Call up LaStella and see if he can provide some contact.
Seriously. What does Pastornicky have to do to get just one start?
Looks like a Pena/Uggla platoon to me.
At this point I strongly suspect that 2b is a straight platoon with Pena playing against RHP (he can’t hit lefties any better than Uggla) and Uggla trying to hold the short half of that platoon against the Rev.
@10 – play better than Dan Uggla when he does.
I stand corrected.
edit: If it is a platoon good. In the AJC article yesterday Fredi said something about matchups but dismissed a straight up platoon.
Pastornicky has fewer at bats than some of our pitchers.
Uggla has a career reverse platoon split. It should be rev against lefties every time. Pena against lefties every time. Pena at 3rd or short once and a while if a lefty is pitching. If not, and CJ needs a break (also reverse platoon split every year before last year), then use Rev.
On Braves Radio just now, Fredi spoke encouragingly about Ian Thomas. He started recently and pitched three good innings. Fredi said they want him to work on his slider. I thought he pitched well enough to stick, but with Floyd and Harang coming back, it’s best he’s in Gwinnett and learning rather than rotting on the bench.
Lemmer: “I think the Braves are the team to be beat in the NL East this year.”
Oh, Lemmer…
Nice, Mike.
To be fair, Lemmer went into a coma on the evening of April 27, and woke up only yesterday night, and saw the Braves beat the Cardinals.
Is Mike really fooling them this badly, or are the Cardinals terrible guessing with two strikes?
Well, we did score two last night.
C’mon, Mike, get it together.
We scored three runs a couple of games ago.
That is getting it together, even if it means allowing another precious run.
Two runs? That would take the Braves about thirteen innings to score.
And the last time Wainwright faced the Braves, he allowed one run in a complete game. So there’s that.
Whew!
Freddie!! A run!
Two bats we need to produce, do. Justin and Freddie, thank you.
When you allow two hits to the career .545 OPS guy batting ninth, this is what often happens.
I’m sick of this bullshit where we allow the other team to score immediately after we score.
Last one to leave please turn out the lights.
Well, the win last night was fun, at least. I hope this series doesn’t come back to bite us at the end of the season.
The winning streak was fun while it lasted.
We could tie this … if we have 21 innings to do it.
At some point we’re gonna need to score like 8 runs to win a game. Might as well start now.
man this is just painful to watch
Our bench can’t hit but there was no reason to let Minor hit there. We needed that run and of course Minor is still getting lit up out there.
Including the minor leagues, Minor’s allowed a 5.23 ERA and one home run every 3 2/3 innings.
Can we sue Dr. Dick for malpractice? This quack broke our pitcher.
Still cant believe we traded Wainwright, Marquis and Ray King for JD Drew and Eli Marrero … worst trade ever .. well next to the Texiera trade.
I watched Minor in his last rehab outing. He looked bad. He still looks bad. Up in the zone, painfully slow, too well-located. I don’t have the faith…
Two-for-nine with RISP so far tonight, if that sort of thing matters. Progress?
EDIT: Two-for-10. And everyone not surnamed Freeman is one-for-eight. So, no.
We’ve hit 5 doubles and scored 1 run?
Maybe it is Minor who need to be sent back to the minor for further fixing…
Positives from tonight:
1) Adam Wainwright did not shut us out
2) David Hale
Other than that, this team is still scuffling pretty badly.
This offense is bad. The Rockies have 100 more RBIs than the Braves do. Ditching Uggla is a start, but it’s going to take a lot more to get this team to be a contender.
@46 Jason Heyward really needs to start hitting better, and we need more from CJ, BJ, and Gattis.
@46
There’s no doubt the Braves are doomed.
Rather ironic song selection with “Happy” between innings, unless the connection is to play the worst possible song for a team hitting as badly as an MLB team can. In which case, I would have suggested Kid Rock’s crime against music and humanity, “All Summer Long.” Phil Collins couldn’t have dreamed of creating aural torture like that.
#thirdplaceproblems
It might be time to unleash the Collins slumpbuster.
Okay, somebody’s gonna have to go back in time and kill Hitler again.
Recrapped.