‘The necessary changes having been made’ – they were certainly necessary in our case but not too much seems to have changed. One awful pitched innings spoiled an otherwise stirring performance tonight. Young Braves pitchers, shuffle them as you will, continue to show their fragility. In this instance a promising early 3-1 lead vaporized in the fourth when the ever talented and loyally promoted Tyrell Jenkins melted down in the 4th and left giving up 9 runs, all earned. He had taken the place of many others, themselves up and down, changes galore.
(Change can sometimes hit the absurd note. This week the Spanish La Liga, ever image conscious, warned clubs that in any home televised game that they failed to manage a 75% seat occupancy they would be fined, fine doubled if less than 50% occupied. To help they offered to have TV cameramen not show any large vacant seat areas and, when even that was not enough, to supply tarpaulins to cover the offending blocks. Seriously. Now that’s change. Will it work? As farce, maybe.) Tori Kelly seems a safer bet for our lonely acres, 42,000 here tonight.
They actually ended up seeing a good ball game as well. It started promisingly Jenkins getting through the first undamaged and our hitters giving Scherzer some stick, Adonis doubling off the wall to score two and give us a lead.. In the frightful 8 run third Ramos made all three outs – how’s that for a change, when did that last ever happen? At 9-3 Weber was the mop up choice and did a more than decent job. Daniel Murphy was red hot having just learned his lead in the batting title chase from LaMahieu was down to one point – he could be uncatchable now after a week of Braves pitching. What was a change in this area was 2 or 3 years back when a Braves hitter led this contest most of the season only to lose it late. He won no popularity contests for it, either.
(Jose Peraza went 3 for 4 with a homer tonight against his former club, he’s now got over 100 ML AB’s, that’s a change) Vizzy came on in our game after last night’s fiasco and managed to get through the 8th without cost. He’d already cost us last night’s game, Jenkins this. Trea Turner got the 4th inning going for the Nats with a 3 run bomb but struck out twice. To know why he will become twice the player Swanson ever can be you don’t need stats – use your eyes. We await our Venezuelan salvation- bring him up in 2018, time enough, early, for a CHANGE!
Our hitters did not roll over, they came back just as they had done last night. We had picked up to 10/6 by the end of the 8th forcing Dusty back into his pen, repeatedly. Final was 11/9 Jace having doubled Freddie in, Chase following and driving home another 2. Drecker, the tying run, popped up.
Our record against the Nats this season is awful…lost 10 of last 11. In the first half of the season we couldn’t hit them worth a lick, this time around it’s been the pitching. One more tomorrow , DeLaCruz vs. Gio. Change? Nah. Please!
Tori Kelli
essentially as seen on telly
Unbreakable Smile, Shoulda’ Been Us
Tyrell and Viz back riding the bus.
I believe this game should clearly fall in the moral victory category
Moral victory definition – A game you are supposed to lose and lose, but you make it surprisingly close and play hard.
With this definition I would say that the Braves are leading the league in moral victories. Of course, on paper they are supposed to lose just about every game. I think this is somewhere around 10 to 15 moral victories so far. Yesterday’s game was a moral victory also. Way to go Barves!
If Aybar, Markakis, and Inciarte had played in April and May like they did in June-August, we would be flirting with a 70-win season.
In particular, I wonder if watching Inciarte and Kemp every day has changed any minds about their relative value. He looks like an All-Star center fielder right now.
Anyhoo, we are 44-78 with 40 games to play. To avoid 100 losses, we need to go 19-21 (yikes). While the Twins remain 4.5 games ahead of us, the other pack of bad teams have pulled out to 7-8 game leads, likely putting them out of reach.
@3
100+-
the Won/Loss Mathematician
as absorbed as was Fermi with nuclear fission
while projecting our path to conclusion
fights to repel his very own confusion.
JWDB..John, i am an avid follower. How else could we keep up with all this mess.
When recaps are better than the games, you might be a Braves fan. Thanks, blazon.
Mutatis Mutandis. What a great phrase.
7 straight losses.
I had been asking for our rotation to be full of pitching prospects, and this is what I get. Starter ERAs, before Tyrell was demoted: 2.90, 3.82, 4.45, 5.73, 6.20. I wouldn’t be surprised if they’re averaging less than 5 IP a start in August at this point. Brutal.
I think I’m there with this team. There is such a thing as moral victories with this team. Offense pounded out 12 hits and 9 runs, bullpen pitched well, and we played good defense. The problem with rebuilding with pitching is that the starting pitcher has so much influence over the outcome of the game, so you’ve essentially hitched your wagon to a Molotov cocktail.
bravesjournal.com seems to be down.
And we have Markakis at 1B, Jace in CF, and Dansby is leading off. Snitker’s on peyote this morning.
I wonder if there are a few teams looking at Cakes and Frenchy and want to see if they can do other things.
Well, I’m really pulling for a Braves win today.
If the Braves can end their 7-game losing streak today, it would give them losing streaks of 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 and 9 for the year. That would be cool. I can’t imagine it would be unprecedented, but it would still be cool.
Kemp told to get in shape:
http://m.ajc.com/news/sports/baseball/braves-to-kemp-get-in-better-shape/nsJ2D/
@12, Hmmm…. must be eating tubs of ice cream in the clubhouse to get a public spanking like that.
Chip and Joe said something about Matt being told to shape up shortly after the trade. I’m surprised it took so long to get in print.
De la Cruz is still only 27. I didn’t realize that.
Predict the bad contract swap with the Yankees that lands us McCann. Go.
De la Cruz is growing on me.
De la Cruz’s ERA is what’s growing.
That’s an ouchie.
That first baseman we got is clutch.
Yeah, bout time we sat that Freeman stiff.
My barber says:
Kemp and Vizciano for McCann and cash
In Spring Training, I wouldn’t have believed you if you told me that Wisler, Jenkins, and Blair would not be in Atlanta. One or two of them, sure. But all three? This sucks. Flat. Out. Sucks.
In fact, I probably wouldn’t have believed it in July.
Double Drecker.
The Nats broadcasters, as the Nats can of course do no wrong p, have been ranting about how bad the infield is at the Ted, causing the error free Nats to butcher routine plays.
Kemp silences his critics.
Yep, it is amazing how a bad field causes fielders to overthrow the ball.
Austin Riley hit his 16th homer today. Kid’s really been turning it on the last few weeks.
@22, Maybe don’t look at what you had to say about the pitching side of the rebuild in May.
🙁
That run seems to be moving in the opposite direction!
Since that point, our defense seems to have improved. Garcia and Aybar stopped kicking it with frequency, AJP is gone, but we did lose defense in LF. We’ve certainly upgraded offensively.
Our pitching, IMO, is at a low point in the performance vs. expectations continuum. But it’s simply that: a low point. The development of 12 pitching prospects is not going to be linear. I wouldn’t have believed all three of those guys would be absent from the roster in August, but it can change quickly. At that point in May, Wisler had just come off consecutive 8 IP starts, then had 4 straight quality starts, but then had an ERA of 8 for two months.
I could sure go for another “high point” of expectations like May.
Oh, and do you have these comments of mine archived, by the way? 🙂
Bases loaded, no outs, and of course Beckham grounds into a double play. I know it’s a Sunday alternate lineup, but still, why do we keep giving him starts?
Why didn’t we see Freeman over Beckham?
I think we may need to hold hands, light a candle, and hold an exorcism for Brian Snitker. Get thee behind us, Fredi!
@33
He didn’t exactly handle Jenkins’s meltdown last night particularly well, either, while we’re airing recent Snitker grievances.
I know some people on here have begun to convince themselves that he should be offered a full-time contract at the end of the season, but I must say I still don’t think that’s a very good idea. I’d rather go outside the organization and find someone entirely new, personally. If we must remain within the organization, I’d prefer give the job to Pendleton or Eddie Perez. Nothing against Snitker, I appreciate what he’s done this year and I’d offer him his Gwinnett job back or a spot on the Major League coaching staff, whichever he wants, but I’d rather not tie myself to him for multiple years as manager. I think that could go wrong pretty quickly.
JACE!
More peyote please.
BRAVES WIN!!!
Recapped.
@30, Nope, it was just that that one was memorable for its mission-accomplished-
I didn’t expect that much more than what we got from Wisler and Blair, but it sure seems like Coppy expected more. Any optimists out there aren’t alone.
This talk of McCann worries me. Coppy is going to try to rush this thing and do something stupid.